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Friday, April 28, 2000
Work may have hurt bird habitat
Study of crew's impact on land is under way
By Aimée Courtice
Caller-Times
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| George Gongora/Caller-Times |
| A blue heron makes its way between heavy equipment tracks on Padre Island where crews continue to replace old poles. Environmental officials are worried the tracks could be harmful to the piping plover, a threatened species of bird. |
Environmental officials are worried that crews replacing power lines along State Highway 361 may have interfered with a habitat for the piping plover, a threatened bird species.
Pat Bacak-Clements, a biologist from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, said officials do not know how much of the habitat has been affected by the heavy machinery rolling across land just north of Packery Channel and near Newport Pass.
Officials from Fish and Wildlife, Texas Department of Parks and Wildlife, the Texas General Land Office and the Corps of Engineers will meet Tuesday in Corpus Christi to discuss how any damage will be assessed.
Fish and Wildlife officials discovered deep tracks about a week ago when they went to observe the project, Bacak-Clements said. Since then, the General Land Office has recommended that a biologist monitor the site full time.
The tracks run through part of the Mollie Beattie Coastal Habitat, two tracts of land totaling about 1,000 acres owned by the General Land Office and made up of algal flats, which are mud, sand and algae.
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| George Gongora/Caller-Times |
| Pat Clements, a biologist with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, studies tracks Thursday left by heavy equipment near a bird habitat along State Highway 361. |
The crews, contracted by Central Power and Light, have been replacing 50 utility poles since March 1, said Ken Griffin, area business manager for CPL in Corpus Christi. Everyone involved understood that some damage was inevitable.
"We try to minimize any impact," he said.
Bacak-Clements said representatives from the land office, CPL, Fish and Wildlife and the state Parks and Wildlife met before the project to discuss what areas the crews should avoid. She said damage was expected to occur next to the poles and the 50-foot wide area between the poles and the road.
But Bacak-Clements said environmental officials weren't expecting the deep tracks they found. Some tracks extend at least 300 yards from of the poles across the algal flats.
"We met with all the boss types," she said. "But maybe the people driving the machinery weren't briefed."
Johnny French, a Fish and Wildlife biologist in Corpus Christi, said the flats are essential to the piping plover, a threatened species which spends about half the year on the Texas coast.
French said the piping plover, because of its small size, short beak and legs, cannot hunt for food even in shallow water. Instead, it feeds on the small bugs and worms found in the surface crust of the flats.
The deep tracks, French said, may cause pools of water and vegetation to form, preventing the piping plover from feeding.
Bacak-Clements said some of the tracks, especially those in very dry and very wet areas, may be leveled by rain and wind, which would prevent pools and vegetation from forming. But the middle areas may be harder to restore, she said.
"We'll have to do an assessment and see what areas can be fixed," Bacak-Clements said. "This will all be part of a much longer process."
Work in the area is expected to last at least another two weeks, said David Thomas, a staff ecologist with an environmental consulting firm in Austin and who is monitoring the site this week to make sure crews stay within 25 feet on each side of the poles.
Staff writer Aimée Courtice can be reached at 886-3622 or by e-mail at courticea@caller.com
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