Audubon wants to recognize refuge's importance for birds

JOHN DODGE, THE OLYMPIAN

Originally published December 8, 2001

GRAYS HARBOR COUNTY -- An international conservation effort to protect birds from decline and extinction has its eyes on the intertidal mudflats west of Hoquiam.

The area, Bowerman Basin, is already a national wildlife refuge and a major migratory resting and feeding ground for hundreds of thousands of shorebirds each spring.

If the National Audubon Society has its way, Bowerman Basin will soon be designated a Globally Important Bird Area, one of four such areas in the state and 81 nationwide.

"Birds are in trouble and this is a chance to make a difference," Audubon President John Flicker said in announcing the nomination of the 81 sites for special recognition.

Nominated sites will be reviewed by top bird scientists worldwide before being endorsed by BirdLife International in Cambridge, England, which is coordinating the international effort.

Bowerman Basin was nominated because it hosts up to 250,000 shorebirds each late April and early May.

The area is a crucial stopover on their 7,000-mile journey from South America to their Arctic breeding grounds.

Some 20 shorebird species, many in their colorful breeding plumage, participate in frenetic feeding behavior and aerial ballets on and above the 2,100-acre basin.

While the entire Grays Harbor estuary hosts migratory shorebirds, roughly half the birds congregate in the basin because it is the last place on the harbor to cover with water at high tide and the first to be exposed at low tide.

Bowerman Basin received special protection with the creation of the Grays Harbor National Wildlife Refuge in 1988.

The refuge designation came just seven years after Steve Herman, former professor at The Evergreen State College, and his students conducted the first thorough shorebird survey in the basin, counting some 500,000 individual birds one late April day.

In recent years, 3,000 to 5,000 birdwatchers have trekked to the basin for the shorebird spectacle and the Grays Harbor Shorebird Festival.

Tourism increase?

The numbers of visitors could swell in years ahead if the site receives international notoriety, said Diane Schwickerath, a member of Audubon's Grays Harbor chapter.

"One of the biggest impacts would be on the local economy," she said. "It could make it well known around the world."

Designation as a globally important bird area might attract scientists and researchers to answer questions about the effects of habitat changes in the basin and trends in shorebird populations, Herman said.

For example, the number of individual birds seen on Bowerman Basin at the peak of the migration appears to be on the decline, said U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologist Nanette Seto.

"We're not seeing the types of numbers they saw in the 1980s," she said.

It could mean the shorebirds are dispersing more widely throughout Grays Harbor, she said.

Herman has observed a buildup of sediment and marsh grasses in the basin, shrinking the feeding grounds by some 30 percent during the past 20 years.

There could be a direct link between habitat loss in the basin and declining bird numbers, he said.

"If the sediment is allowed to keep building up, Bowerman Basin as we know it won't exist in 10 years," Herman said.

How it works

A site is nominated as a Globally Important Bird Area and then evaluated by a team of ornithologists and scientists to determine if the area is significant on a worldwide scale.

An area must meet one or more of four criteria by supporting species that are:

- Threatened or endangered.

- Vulnerable because they are not widely distributed.

- At risk due to their populations being concentrated in one habitat type.

- Congregating in large numbers.

More than 100 nations participate in the bird habitat protection program coordinated by BirdLife International of Cambridge, England.

To learn more about the program, visit www.birdlife.net or www.audubon.org.

On the Web:

- Black Hills Audubon Society

- Audubon-Washington!

The Olympian Copyright 2001

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