Broken Hockey Sticks Get New Life Thanks To Central Regional Students

BERKELEY, NJ — If you have any experience with hockey, you know that occasionally too forceful of a slapshot can result in a stick breaking in two.

What do you do with those broken sticks? The material used nowadays doesn't break down in landfills. But it turns out they can be recycled into something completely unexpected - an artificial oyster reef.

Central Regional's ice hockey team has been turning their broken sticks into reefs for "the past six or seven years," head coach Joseph Pellicio told Patch.

The initiative was started by Bob Wasno at Florida Gulf Coast University down south, Pellicio said.

"They were throwing out so many broken sticks," Pellicio said.

Wasno was using the sticks to build artificial reefs there and Pellicio was interested in bringing the project to Ocean County.

Since then, Pellicio estimates the team has used 600 to 700 broken sticks to help marine life.

It's part of the Rink2Reef project, of which Central Regional represents the New Jersey chapter.

"The 9.17-cubic- foot hockey-stick units become home to as many as 400 oysters," according to the Rink2Reef website. "A single Rink2Reef habitat could clean 20,000 gallons of water per day."

Oysters are vitally important in coastal areas, and not just for eating. The filter-feeding mollusks remove damaging algae from the water in addition to stabilizing shorelines and creating a habitat for other marine life.

The hockey team works with NY/NJ Baykeeper and ReClam the Bay to build the reefs which are then installed not only in the Barnegat Bay but up north in the Hudson River, Raritan Bay and more, Pellicio said.

After the artificial reefs have been installed, the team is later invited to see what they built and learn about the science behind it.

"Our kids have gravitated to it," Pellicio said, adding that the parents and community love the project too. The whole team shows up for the builds. It helps to expose the teammates to a lot of things "outside of hockey," he said.

Central Regional was the first team outside of Florida to partake in the project. The school is part of the NHL Green Initiative.

And it's expanding, too, Pellicio said. The NHL is getting involved, with a couple of teams already part of it. He's working on getting the Devils in on it, too.

"It's great all around," Pellicio said.