New islands dot inland bays for first time since 1930s

Everyone wants a safe place to make a home, and the common tern is no different.

But looking down from the sky over Maryland, a place is hard to find, so the bird moves on.

Ask Regional Ecologist Dave Brinker why. There will be a passionate answer. He will wave his arms at Ocean City: "Because of all that. That was their former habitat."

"The den of evil," or more appropriately, the den of development, has devastated the market for a suitable nesting spot, Brinker said.

"They're now restricted to these little islands that are disappearing because we are everywhere else. We have met the enemy and he is us," Brinker said. "If we want these populations to persist, to do their ecological work for the system, for people to be able to come out here and birdwatch and enjoy them, they need a place to nest, and they're disappearing."

Brinker, currently working for the Maryland Department of Natural Resource's Natural Heritage Program, has studied waterbirds for 30 years. He is now involved with an Army Corps of Engineering project that is building new islands in the Isle of Wight, Sinepuxent and Chincoteague bays for the first time since the storm of 1933 carved the Ocean City Inlet.

"I've seen a lot of islands disappear in the coastal bays and the Chesapeake Bay in those 30 years of working," he said. "Our hope is things like these new islands might stabilize (waterbird populations) above zero, and keep some type of residual population here."

Without the new islands, common terns would no longer be in Maryland by 2020, Brinker said. Other critical birds, such as black skimmers and royal terns are also at risk, he added.

Skimmer Island

The islands that currently exist in the bays are a complex mixture of nature and human interaction. To explain their creation, it's easiest to look at a familiar landmark to anyone crossing the Route 50 bridge into Ocean City — Skimmer Island, the exposed patch of sand on the north side of the bridge near Hooper's Crab House.

It's been as big as 7 acres before, but now it's less than 2.

When water comes into the Inlet from the ocean it brings sand along with it, but when it hits the bays the water slows down again, dropping the sand and creating flood tidal shoals. The state also put rocks around the scouring of the bridge, Brinker said, slowing down the water even more and creating Skimmer Island.

As channels were kept clear the island was built up more. It has since been nourished with dredge, the sand that's pulled up when navigational corridors are cleared.

Currently north of the Route 50 bridge, a dredging vessel can be seen pumping sand from the east channel to one of the new islands being built near 20th Street. Sand and water go through a head at the bottom and become a fluid mix, pumped through black pipes that run along the bottom to the new island.

A mix of nature bringing in the sand to form the islands — and humans building them up with dredge from navigational channels — is also what created the 29 original islands in the bays after the storm of 1933. Once the Inlet was cut to create navigational channels, sand was dug out and turned into islands dotting the coastal bays.

Only three of those original islands remain today. Off of Assateague one sits in the bay, water lapping at its ragged shores. Vegetation and growth cover much of the island.

"They were a great waterbird resource in their hayday, until they disappeared," Brinker said. "This one's maybe got five years of life left before it's gone. Every storm that comes in here batters it. It was a waterbird colony for years, but they won't use it for nesting anymore."

New habitat

Created by the Corps last November, one of the four new islands is just to the south of that original island, and strikingly different in appearance. While the old island resembles land, the new island looks like a mound of sand covered in shell to the untrained eye. Brinker couldn't be happier.

"This will be really good nesting habitat," he said. "This has a lot of potential."

Some vegetation will eventually come to the island, but for the most part the waterbirds looking to nest want barren sand, he said. And the island is out of the way, which is important because human interaction can make or break a nesting colony.

There will be signs telling people to stay away when the birds are nesting, but if those aren't heeded the birds will scatter, leaving eggs and chicks uncovered from the harsh sun. They'll cook, Brinker said.

If humans disturb something such as a robin's nest, it's not too big a deal — there are other robin's nests. That's not the case with the islands.

"When water birds gather on an island like this, all of the colony's nesting efforts can be on one island," Brinker said. "Repeated visits by people ends up disturbing them and causing a lot of chick loss and egg loss. The whole reproductive event for, say, all of Worcester County ends up failing."

The new islands aren't just for waterbirds, Brinker added. They could also be used by terrapins for nesting, horseshoe crabs for spawning and by shorebirds in the fall as resting places.

The new islands should be finished in July, Brinker said. He is hoping they'll used by waterbirds next summer, if not this summer.

"They're used to changes," he said. "They'll say, 'oh, new habitat,' and check it out."

rpacella@gannett.com

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On Twitter @rachaelpacella