It’s not an easy job — removing the pesky invasive reeds called phragmites from the shores of the Ridgewood Reservoir, inside Highland Park on the Brooklyn-Queens border. 

“It’s really hard work, but it’s extremely rewarding getting to see the fruits of your labor,” said N’kosi Newton, an NYC H2O eco-intern from South Jamaica, Queens.

What You Need To Know

  • NYC H2O has an eco-interns program featuring 16 paid summer interns 

  • The environmental education organization spends two days a week time removing invasive species from the Ridgewood Reservoir, now a freshwater pond

  • The reservoir once supplied water to Brooklyn in the 19th and 20th centuries
  • The interns also visit “green” locations like the city’s recycling plant in Brooklyn and the Parks Department’s Native Plant Nursery on Staten Island

The reservoir once supplied water to Brooklyn in the 19th and 20th centuries. Two of the three basins are now forest land. The middle basin has evolved into a freshwater pond fed by rain.

Paid interns from the nonprofit environmental education group NYC H2O are there twice a week, getting rid of the invasive species and improving the health of the body of water.

“They crowd out any other type of vegetation that wants to grow, and the eco-interns are working hard to remove it, and with the material they remove they recycle it and then they plant native species to improve the biodiversity at the reservoir,” Matt Malina, founder and director of NYC H2O, said.

On other days, the interns visit “green” locations like the city’s recycling plant in Brooklyn and the Parks Department’s Native Plant Nursery on Staten Island.

Highland and Forest Park administrator Portia Dyrenforth says the work of the interns and NYC H2O is a huge help.

“We are so grateful to have them here and doing work that the parks department — it’s very difficult to accomplish. Phragmite cutting and also a lot of the other volunteer work that they do and programs they bring to the park, are really invaluable,” Dyrenforth said.

The job keeps New Yorkers like public school teacher Boris Santos of Brooklyn coming back for more. He manages the group of 16 interns. 

“I dedicate my summers, for the last four summers, to this beautiful nature oasis and sanctuary,” he said.