Pocomoke-Nassawango IBA Dedication Ceremony

On behalf of Audubon Maryland-DC and The Nature Conservancy we invite you to attend a ceremony to dedicate the forestlands of the Pocomoke-Nassawango area as an Important Bird Area. The ceremony will take place on Saturday October 11th 2008 at 12 noon at TNC’s Furnacetown Visitor Center, Snow Hill, Maryland. At the ceremony Audubon will recognize the outstanding conservation efforts of several managers of protected lands. The ceremony will be preceded by a bird walk along the visitor center’s swamp boardwalk at 10:30am.

Audubon’s Important Bird Areas Program is currently developing an inventory of the critical sites for bird conservation in Maryland and DC. Important Bird Areas are the focus of Audubon’s bird conservation work and Audubon Maryland-DC is working with several partner organizations to increase protection of critical wildlife habitat on Maryland's Lower Eastern Shore through the land use planning process and other mechanisms. Audubon has provided county planning departments on the lower shore with maps and documentation of Important Bird Areas for inclusion in Comprehensive Plans. You can learn more about the Audubon’s Important Bird Areas Program at our website, http://www.audubonmddc.org/SciCon_IBAs.html

Covering portions of Wicomico, Worcester and Somerset Counties, Pocomoke-Nassawango Important Bird Area is the premier site for forest-interior birds on the Delmarva peninsula due to its extensive and unfragmented forests. The area supports significant numbers of no less than 12 bird species that are nationally at-risk. These include the largest Maryland population of Prothonotary Warblers, which abound in the swamp forests of the Pocomoke River and TNC’s Nassawango Creek Preserve, and the nocturnal Whip-poor-will, which has seen its Maryland distribution shrink by 58% since the 1980s but still finds a refuge in the forested sandy uplands of this Important Bird Area.

We hope you can attend this landmark event. RSVP. If you have further questions please contact David Curson, Audubon Maryland-DC's Director of Bird Conservation at (410) 558 2473 or by e-mail at dcurson@audubon.org or Joe Fehrer, TNC at (410) 632-4761.