Birders flocking to Delmarva region

By Jonathan Starkey
Staff Reporter

	Coastal Point • SUBMITTED A blue heron stalks the Sinepuxent Bay during last year’s birding weekend.

Each year for the past 11, nearly 500 people have converged on the Delmarva Peninsula on the last weekend of April for Delmarva Birding Weekend. In kayaks and canoes, and sometimes on foot, these eco-tourists take in the natural beauty of the peninsula in the event sponsored by Delmarva Low Impact Tourism Experiences (DLITE).

This year won’t be any different. Dave Wilson — the director of DLITE — said he expects more than 400 people to visit the peninsula for this year’s event, which starts today.

“It’s just a great event,” said Jim Rapp, the Salisbury, Md., zoo director who sits on the DLITE board. “It’s just a very positive all around experience.”

The event will start at 4 p.m. on Friday with a Friday Night Fly-in social event at Seacrets Bar and Grill on 49th Street, bayside, in Ocean City. The event’s 21 bird-watching field trips will start early the next morning. While some of the trips are already filled, there is still space. Call the Worcester County tourism office at 1-800-852-0335 to book a spot on one of the trips, which range in time from a couple of hours to all day, and in price from $15 to $75.

“This particular event gets a lot of repeat business,” said Lisa Challenger, Worcester County tourism director. “Some people have been doing this event for six years or more. They immediately sign up for new trips. Our guides are all so good. That’s one of the reasons people love coming back.”

All of the trips will be guided by either professionals or avid bird watchers from across the Eastern region, according to Rapp. Some 40 of these avid birders volunteered to help run the event by serving as guides, pointing out birds to visitors and local residents who participate.

“They love sharing their passion for birds. They love getting out there with people,” Rapp said of the volunteers. “The surveys we get back rave every year about the guides.”

And since the weekend takes place during the spring migration season, most participants rave about the wildlife they see on the trips, as well, he said. Rapp said that about 300 species of birds fly through or make the Delmarva Peninsula home over the course of a year.

On a good weekend in late April, birders might spot 150 to 160 of those species. Some warblers and shorebirds, such as ruddy turnstones and red knots, are migrating north from the Caribbean or South America and can be spotted on the peninsula at this time.

Birds that spent the winter here but are about to leave — such as duck, geese, loons and other waterfowl — can still be spotted for about another week on the peninsula. And some other birds are migrating to the area from the Caribbean and South America to stay through the summer. Herons, hawks and owls can also roam the peninsula and can be spotted in abundance in trips during Delmarva Birding weekend.

“In one morning, you’ll see 40 different animals,” Rapp said. “The reason the diversity is so high is we’re taking people to the ocean, the backland bays and, in the mainland, we’re doing forests, fields, swamps, marshes, tidelands. That’s what makes this such a good birding spot,” he added.

DLITE holds this event and others each year to educate citizens, businesspeople and lawmakers on the peninsula about the power of eco-tourism. Nearly 500 people show up every year for the event — most staying in the hotels, eating at area restaurants and patronizing local shops, generating revenues for area businesses.

DLITE itself breaks even, spending about $7,000 on the event annually, all of which is paid to local boating captains and to rent canoes, kayaks and other equipment.

“It’s to educate the public about nature, conservation and wildlife and promote nature tourism,” Wilson said of this weekend’s event and others. And, he said, it’s also to “see how many dollars the nature economy brings to them.”

The tour is designed to flaunt the area’s natural assets, he added, and to remind lobby lawmakers to stop harmful growth and flaunt those assets to them, as well.

“It’s to help show them keeping them in a natural state is good for their bottom line,” Wilson said. “We kept trying to push that.”