Kenny Chesney’s No Shoes Reefs To Team Up With Tampa Bay Watch For Earth Week

Kenny Chesney‘s “Here And Now 2022” tour will kick off at Tampa’s Raymond James Stadium on Saturday, April 23. To celebrate his return to the road, No Shoes Reefs has teamed up with Tampa Bay Watch for five days of Earth Week activities.

The week will culminate tomorrow (April 22) with the Living Shoreline Project deploying Reef Balls filled with sea grass and planting the salt marsh grass behind them to prevent further erosion and rebuild lost shoreline. The Living Shoreline Project will sink the Reef Balls into the sediment, where they are heavy enough to remain lodged and allow the sea grass to grow. Their presence protects the shore from further erosion, and the salt marsh grass growth and eventual coral growth rebuilds the shoreline that’s been lost since the ‘50s.

“Talk about a way to merge my worlds,” Chesney says. “We have been doing various projects around the country. But when Tampa Bay Watch had a week of actual activities designed to not just walk people through the process, but teach them how to not only make Reef Balls but allow people to deploy the Reef Balls filled with seagrass on Earth Day, it was the best kind of synergy possible.

“When you can work with local groups, they understand their needs, their issues—and by supporting them, we can help them take care of their oceanfront in ways that make sense,” he shares. “But being able to be part of something so all-encompassing in Tampa as we’re starting to get back to bringing No Shoes Nation together is the perfect thing to kick off a tour.”

No Shoes Reefs has been integral in various projects in Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, Maryland and Connecticut, expanding its reach to support other organizations sharing its vision and efforts.