When I hear the words “pine barrens,” I either think of the area in New Jersey called the Pine Barrens or the band, which was also called The Pine Barrens, that played at my 7th grade class’ end of the year party. Until today, though, I didn’t really know what pine barrens were beyond a big forest of pine trees. There’s a lot more to them than that, and, luckily, Wikipedia is able to help out. Its definition of pine barrens is “plant communities that occur on dry, acidic, infertile soils dominated by grasses, forbs, low shrubs, and small to medium sized pines; most extensive barrens occur in large areas of sandy glacial deposits, including outwash plains, lakebeds, and outwash terraces along rivers.” These areas aren’t typically found in populated areas, which makes it surprising that Long Island has its own Pine Barrens (see the Wikipedia article for all of the specifics). That’s why the Long Island Pine Barrens Society exists—to protect an ecosystem that is constantly under pressure from development. They’re based in Riverhead, NY, and their focus as a non-profit is on education and advocacy.

Barren Isn’t Always a Bad Thing

Beyond preserving open space in the Long Island Pine Barrens, the Long Island Pine Barrens Society also works to preserve drinking water. These two ideals fit together because the Pine Barrens is essential to recharging the ground water that Long Island relies on for drinking. There’s a lot more to learn about the Long Island Pine Barrens Society, and the best way to do that is to check out their website. They have tons of information on their history and the work that they do along with more general organizational information. One thing that they don’t have on their website is a Jobs page, but they do list jobs on Idealist. Right now they’re looking for a Project Coordinator, and it appears that the job would be well suited for a new or recent grad. You can get all of the details from the Idealist posting.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

• PineBarrens.org
• Jobs at Long Island Pine Barrens Society (Idealist)
• About Long Island Pine Barrens Society
• Staff at Long Island Pine Barrens Society
• Long Island Pine Barrens Society News

Have you ever visited pine barrens?

We've identified Long Island Pine Barrens Society as having career opportunities in the following categories:

• advocacy
• all employers
• conservation
• green
• New York
• non-profit
• project management

---

Jobs Near You

---