Delaware Bayshore, USA, Receives Globally Significant IBA Designation

As many readers will recall, in May 2011 we celebrated the 25^th anniversary of the Delaware Bay WHSRN Site of Hemispheric Importance and its many dedicated partners in Delaware and New Jersey. Partners from Canada to Patagonia were also honored for their ongoing efforts to conserve the very same shorebird species that connect them in a special way through annual long-distance migrations, such as the Red Knot (Calidris canutus rufa).

Delaware Bayshore IBA (in red) / Courtesy of New Jersey Audubon

Our local-international celebration continues with the recent news from New Jersey Audubon that a sizable portion of the Bay has been designated a Globally Significant Important Bird Area (IBA). The IBA program, established by BirdLife International and implemented in the United States by the National Audubon Society, is a global effort to identify the areas most important to birds and to focus conservation efforts where they will have the greatest effect. To date, there are 449 such IBAs throughout the country.

The 50,000-acre area now known as the Delaware Bayshore IBA stretches along 50 miles of coastal southern New Jersey, from Fairfield Township in Cumberland County to Cape May Point in Cape May County. Much of the land is protected, including by 13 State Wildlife Management Areas and the Cape May National Wildlife Refuge.

New Jersey Audubon (NJA) and the National Audubon Society worked together to submit years of shorebird and waterfowl survey data to a panel of nationally and internationally recognized bird experts, demonstrating that this area of the Bay meets the IBA program criteria. The panel concurred that four bird species are present in numbers that meet or exceed the Globally Significant threshold: Red Knot and Ruddy Turnstone (Arenaria interpres) on migration, and Snow Goose (Chen caerulescens) and American Black Duck (Anas rubripes) during the winter.

Ruddy Turnstone (Arenaria interpres) / Amanda Boyd, USFWS

Dr. David Mizrahi, NJA’s Vice-President of Research and Monitoring, noted that this designation will help not only Red Knots and Ruddy Turnstones, but several other shorebird species of special concern, like the Semipalmated Sandpiper (Calidris pusilla) and Sanderling (Calidris alba). “All of these shorebird species,” said Dr. Mizrahi, “rely on the resources of Delaware Bay during their migration north to the breeding grounds. Also, tens of thousands of birds of prey and millions of songbirds that migrate through the Delaware Bay will benefit greatly from this very important designation.”

Identifying and designating Global IBAs helps the conservation community better direct very limited resources to those places widely recognized as supporting the most significant bird populations, facing the greatest threats, or having significant management needs. The recognition will raise the profile of this portion of the Bay beyond the local level. “It’s a special place with global conservation value,” said Dr. Larry Niles with the Conserve Wildlife Foundation of New Jersey. Dr. Niles is one of the chief shorebird biologists who have worked unceasingly over the years to mobilize bird research and call attention to the value of conserving the Bay’s resources. “Raising the visibility of the area to this level,” he continued, “will help support local efforts to take care of this region in a way that benefits the community and the wildlife.”

Red Knot (Calidris canutus rufa) / © Pablo Petracci

The NJA staff first began collecting shorebird data via aerial surveys in the early 1980s in order to quantify the number and species of shorebirds using the Bayshore. These surveys were later assumed by the N.J. Department of Environmental Protection’s Division of Fish and Wildlife, which has performed them annually since 1986—the year Delaware Bay became the first WHSRN site. The data on American Black Duck and Snow Goose in support of the IBA designation came from annual winter waterfowl surveys also conducted by the Division.

The plight of the two shorebird species that helped to merit the area’s designation lends a bittersweet note to the celebration. Today, the numbers of Red Knots and Ruddy Turnstones stopping to “refuel” at the Bayshore en route north to Arctic nesting grounds are significantly lower than they were in early aerial surveys. Years of research by Dr. Niles and other scientists have shown the declines to be linked to an inadequate supply of horseshoe crab eggs, the birds’ primary “fuel,” on Delaware Bay beaches due to humans harvesting the crabs for bait. Thankfully, partners at this WHSRN Site have been making great strides towards both abating this threat and gaining federal protection for the rapidly declining Red Knot.

Thanks and congratulations to all for the years of hard work and dedication behind the new Delaware Bayshore Globally Significant IBA! 

Editor’s note: Many thanks to New Jersey Audubon for permission to incorporate into our article the details, quotes, and map from their recent press release. 

For more information, please contact Jean Lynch (jean.lynch@njaudubon.org), Stewardship Project Director-South Region, New Jersey Audubon; or visit the New Jersey IBA Program website.