Restoring Saltmarshes
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Warden on the Water
New Hampshire's game wardens -- known as Conservation Officers -- are charged
with keeping a watchful eye over the state's fish and wildlife resources.
Wildlife Journal spends a day with a longtime conservation officer, getting
a behind-the-scenes look at how his love of fishing dovetails with his personal
and professional lives... and how his work upholding fishing laws and protecting
New Hampshire's fisheries resources impacts time spent at home and in the community.
Wild
Ways: Wildlife Rehabilitation
How can humans help prepare orphaned and injured wildlife for their return to the wild? In our second visit to the Elaine Conners Center for Wildlife Management in Madison, N.H., program director Cathie Gregg introduces us a bathtub full of ducklings. We'll also meet a gray fox kit in need of a surrogate family.
Founded in 1991 after a generous gift from lifelong Madison resident Elaine Conners, the facility serves as a hospital and rehabilitation center. The 16-acre property includes individual enclosures for animals -- including one on a small pond for waterfowl and reptiles -- and a large aviary.
Wildlife rehabilitators (licensed by N.H. Fish and Game), trained and qualified to care for wildlife transitioning from captivity back to their natural habitat, usually take in wildlife found orphaned or injured.
In New Hampshire as in most states, the possession of wildlife by regular citizens is a violation of fish and wildlife law. Wild animals are just that - wild. But human settlement of what once were wild places the responsibility on us to care for species adversely affected by our activities. It is our nature to nurture, and we have risen to the challenge by developing the science of wildlife rehabilitation.
For more information, contact Cathie Gregg at the Elaine Conners Center for Wildlife, 603-367-9453.
Salt Marsh Restoration
Salt marshes are an important part of the ecology of New Hampshire's seacoast. These low coastal grasslands are transitional areas between land and water that are affected by the flow of ocean tides. Found on the edges of estuaries (places where a river flows into the ocean), the water in salt marshes flows very slowly because sediments are dropped from the water and build up a muddy environment for plants to grow and small animals to live. In this segment, Wildlife Journal focuses on the Great Bay Estuary and the impact of human development. It also looks at efforts to restore the marshes back to health.
Join Steve Mirick at Chapman's Landing in Stratham as he tracks the Nelson's Sharp-tail Sparrow, a small brown bird whose entire lifecycle depends on the healthy salt marsh. Alan Ammann from the Natural Resources Conservation Service shows us how to restore a salt marsh, as he works on recovering 27 acres across the street from Rye Harbor at Awcomin Salt Marsh. It's a prime example of how technology and volunteerism come together. Finally, fifth graders from Dondero School in Portsmouth go to the Seacoast Science Center to learn all about salt marshes, and they build a filter to simulate the actions of the marshes.
Wild
Places: Bellamy River Wildlife Management Area
Located on the west shore of the Bellamy River between Dover and Portsmouth, Bellamy River Wildlife Management Area (WMA) features a wide variety of land types and habitats -- the river and its banks, of course, plus tidal creeks, saltwater and freshwater wetlands, second-growth woodlands, grasslands and former agricultural fields.
Bellamy has been a WMA since the early 1990s, after being acquired through the New Hampshire Land Conservation Investment Program and donations. Surrounded by several urban communities, Bellamy is valued by its human neighbors for hunting, fishing and other outdoor opportunities -- and as a natural refuge for all kinds of wildlife. The Bellamy River WMA lies within the Atlantic Flyway, so black ducks, Canada geese and even coot frequent the area. It's a major feeding and resting area for these and other migrating waterfowl, plus estuarine and shorebird species such as herons, gulls and osprey.
Trails on the 400-acre urban oasis are widely used by birders -- particularly those seeking grassland species -- and other wildlife-watchers, hikers and cross-country skiers. Hunting and trapping are permitted.
A project is underway to re-establish native grasslands at Bellamy River WMA. A commercial timber sale/habitat improvement project was recently completed to create patches and strip cuts to regenerate oak, provide woody browse and increase structural habitat diversity. Click here to download a map of the area.
