Coastal bays holds hope for avian heritage

by Dave Wilson. (Wilson is the public outreach coordinator for the Maryland Coastal Bays Program.)

Home to the most diverse bird population in the entire state, the coastal bays watershed still holds hope for the future of its avian heritage.

While a majority of the strategies in the Coastal Bays Management Plan target water quality, fishing, and boating, other wildlife species— particularly birds— are receiving added attention.

In and around the coastal bays, scientists and birders have spent the last several decades documenting some 360 bird species— the most in Maryland. Every year birders from around the country flock to Worcester County to check out threatened black skimmers, prothonotary warblers, and the endless variety of waterfowl and oceangoing species.

With help from the county’s award-winning Bird Watchers Guide to Delmarva, even the layest of laypeople can pick out snowy egrets, blue herons, ospreys and barred owls. Unlike the Chesapeake, the coastal bays’ oceanside realm provides the quintessential migratory map for peregrine falcons, Coopers
hawks, merlins and glossy ibises.

Situated along the internationally recognized Atlantic Flyway, the coastal bays represent one of the main resting and refueling areas for hundreds of songsbirds, raptors, ducks and waterbirds.

Although the shorebird migration south began in mid-July, the ducks, hawks and falcons are coming through now and will peek in October— perhaps the best month to enjoy the widest variety of easy-to-see species of Worcester’s forests and bays.

To ensure this several thousand year-old winged procession is not extinguished by human intrusion or folly, a number of protection strategies in the Coastal Bays Management Plan are addressing issues ranging from habitat loss to pesticides poisoning.

Among the most significant changes will be forest management and protection. The Maryland Department of Natural Resources has been identifying staging, wintering, and nesting areas around the coastal bays. Already well-known for protecting wildlife and water quality, forests will remain a high priority for identification and preservation.

A recently completed plan to give property owners incentives for planting more deciduous trees and keeping older forests in tact should help declining Forest Interior Dwelling Species (FIDS). Limiting fragmentation and preserving large tracts is also part of the plan. Likewise, bay and streamside forests are being targeted for retention.

The Coastal Bays Rural Legacy Area has permanently protected some 6,000 acres south of Public Landing to the Virginia line over the past four years. The Trust for Public Lands is also working in the Berlin area to protect large remaining forest tracts.

Farmers and homeowners, too, can get in on the action. The Maryland departments of Natural Resources and Agriculture along with the Worcester County Natural Resources Conservation Service will be undergoing additional measures to manage for bird species on agricultural land, and watershed homeowners can now pick up new plant, yardcare and bird house information to help them attract particular species to their own backyards.

There is much in the plan that deals with alternatives to herbicides and pesticides which have wide-ranging impacts on bird species. Incentives for open space preservation in new developments and better controls on invasive bird species like Canada and snow geese are also in the mix.

Of course most of these actions will protect other species as well. Box turtles, beavers, otters and even salamanders benefit when open space preservation is undertaken to protect other species. But perhaps people are the ones who benefit the most.

A world without eagles, gold finches, or blue herons, would be a place devoid of the very things that make it a world in the first place.