Southern New Jersey Woodcock Habitat Network, Salem, Cumberland, and Cape May Counties, New Jersey

About Southern New Jersey

In this region, urban and suburban development mix with intensive agriculture and a variety of natural ecosystems: bayshore, saltmarsh, damp and dry forests, old fields, and grasslands.

Southern New Jersey is extremely important to birds – including songbirds, raptors, shorebirds, and waterfowl – that migrate along the Atlantic Flyway in spring and fall. In autumn, the coast’s configuration funnels these avian migrants down the Cape May Peninsula to the narrowest crossing of Delaware Bay, where they must traverse about 12 miles of open water.

Especially in autumn, large numbers of woodcock congregate in woodlands and thickets, where they feed heavily on earthworms to build up their body-fat reserves before crossing Delaware Bay and continuing south. At night, woodcock fly to grass fields, where they roost. Woodcock also breed in southern New Jersey, and some birds spend the winter in the region as well.

Improving the Land for Woodcock

Biologists and habitat managers with federal and state agencies and private organizations are working to build a network of sites where young-forest and shrubland habitat can be safeguarded, created, and renewed to benefit woodcock and other wildlife.

Cape May National Fish and Wildlife Refuge

An important core installation is 11,025-acre Cape May National Wildlife Refuge near the mouth of Delaware Bay. The refuge provides many acres of moist woodlands, old fields, and thickets where woodcock feed on soil invertebrates, and where other young-forest wildlife, particularly migrating birds, find food and shelter.

During winter, woodcock may find ice-free feeding areas in spring seeps in southern New Jersey.

The refuge’s Comprehensive Conservation Planning document, or CCP, released in 2004, lists as an objective maintaining brushy uplands through the use of machines and controlled burning; letting crop and pasture land revert to brush; and returning upland forest to a brushy state. As of 2010, the refuge is developing a habitat management plan that will spell out habitat improvement measures to be undertaken.

For more information, contact the Cape May National Wildlife Refuge, 24 Kimbles Beach Rd., Cape May Court House, NJ 08210-2078, phone 609-463-0994, capemay@fws.gov. To download a refuge brochure, visit http://www.fws.gov/northeast/capemay/

Mannington Mills Young Forest and Riparian Restoration Project, Salem Township, Salem County

Mannington Mills is a flooring manufacturer in Salem, NJ, in the heart of the Mannington Meadows Important Bird Area (IBA). The company is working with New Jersey Audubon to turn 12 acres of marginal agricultural ground into a forested streamside buffer on part of the Mannington Mills corporate campus.

Congressman Frank LoBiondo (right) and students from a local seventh-grade science class worked at planting native tree and shrub seedlings in a former agricultural field on the Mannington Mills corporate campus.

In 2009-10, volunteers planted 3,000 native tree and shrub seedlings, including arrowood, red osier dogwood, chokecherry, winterberry holly, black willow, green ash, buttonbush, sycamore, and hackberry, creating a young-forest and scrub-shrub habitat with a life expectancy of about 20 years. (Eventually the site will become forest.)

During its first two decades, this project will provide habitat for woodcock and many other birds including these species of conservation concern: blue-winged warbler, prairie warbler, Eastern kingbird, brown thrasher, Eastern towhee, and field sparrow. As the habitat gets older, it will become more useful to bald eagles and colonial nesting herons and egrets.

Funding and Partners: Mannington Mills, New Jersey Audubon Society, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture (Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program), Ruffed Grouse Society, U.S. Geological Survey, National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, Northeast Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies, Wildlife Management Institute.

Salem River Wildlife Management Area, Mannington Township, Salem County

This 320-acre parcel is one of seven units of the 3,000-acre Salem River WMA. A former commercial nursery, the largely forested tract is surrounded on three sides by shallow marsh and provides an island of upland habitat in an intensively farmed area.

Since 2007 managers have used hydro-ax machines to cut down small trees on 17 formerly wooded acres. Other fields are mowed to keep them in grass and shrubs. Herbicide treatments and selective mowing reduce invasive shrubs in favor of native species. Although management efforts are aimed primarily at helping woodcock, other species will also benefit, such as bobwhite quail, wild turkey, songbirds, and cottontail rabbits.

Ultimately, managers plan to add more acres of young forest to the total number that are being renewed here.

On a separate unit of the WMA known as the George Wright Property, land managers are working to maintain and expand another 30 acres of young-forest and scrub-shrub habitat.

Funding and Partners: New Jersey Division of Fish and Wildlife, New Jersey Audubon Society, Ruffed Grouse Society, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, U.S. Geological Survey, National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, Northeast Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies, Wildlife Management Institute.

Gum Tree Corner Wildlife Management Area, Stow Creek Township, Cumberland County

On two fields totaling about 40 acres, a 15-year-old regrowing forest of mainly sweet gum and red maple is being set back to a younger growth stage through the use of a hydro-ax. Fifty-foot-wide strips will be cut in three entries and at five-year intervals, creating landing zones and display areas for woodcock near existing feeding, nesting, and brood-rearing habitat. Other fields on this 1,100-acre WMA provide roosting and singing habitats.

Funding and Partners: New Jersey Division of Fish and Wildlife, Ruffed Grouse Society, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, U.S. Geological Survey, National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, Northeast Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies, Wildlife Management Institute.

Dix Wildlife Management Area, Fairfield Township, Cumberland County

Old fields on this 3,400-acre WMA have damp soils and provide good feeding habitat for woodcock. Many of the fields are overgrown with autumn olive (an invasive shrub) and sweetgum (a native tree). The fields border extensive marshland.

In 2010, 23 acres will be hydro-axed to remove overmature and encroaching trees. Strip cuts will create bands of habitat. Cutting alternating strips every 10 to 15 years will provide woodcock with landing and display areas next to food and cover. Extensive hedgerows of old, brittle autumn olive shrubs divide many fields; hydro-axing the hedgerows will enlarge the fields, and the regrowth of shrubs and young trees will provide better, denser cover. The resulting mosaic of vegetation of differing ages will benefit many birds and mammals in addition to woodcock.

Funding and Partners: New Jersey Division of Fish and Wildlife, Ruffed Grouse Society, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, U.S. Geological Survey, National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, Northeast Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies, Wildlife Management Institute.

Higbee Beach Wildlife Management Area, Lower Township, Cape May County

North of the town of Cape May, this WMA includes 1,100 acres. The New Jersey Division of Fish and Wildlife bought the land to preserve and provide resting and feeding habitats for woodcock and other birds that stage in the area before departing the Cape May Peninsula and flying across Delaware Bay.

Managers have begun pushing back field edges by at least 50 feet to create dense regrowing margins. They are also hydro-axing old hedgerows where the cover has become too open to benefit young-forest wildlife. Herbicide spraying will reduce invasive plants in favor of native ones. Several recently acquired pasture fields are being allowed to grow up as young forest; they will be kept in that growth stage through periodic cutting.

Funding and Partners: New Jersey Division of Fish and Wildlife, New Jersey Audubon Society, Ruffed Grouse Society, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, U.S. Geological Survey, National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, Northeast Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies, Wildlife Management Institute.

Science

In November 2009, biologists with the U.S. Geological Survey’s Patuxent Wildlife Research Center and Moosehorn National Wildlife Refuge began work in Cape May County to collect preliminary data on the use of fields at night by roosting woodcock.

Technicians weigh a woodcock that has been captured at night in a roosting field.

On several state WMAs and Cape May National Wildlife Refuge, technicians used night-lighting techniques to obtain flush counts and to capture woodcock in fields the birds had sought out for roosting. Over 17 nights, 114 woodcock were captured: 67 on the Refuge and 47 on the state WMAs, mainly Higbee Beach WMA. (Captured woodcock were also given leg bands as part of ongoing, longterm banding studies of the species.)

Biologist Dan McAuley of the USGS Patuxent Research Center suggests that the use of these fields by roosting woodcock would likely increase if strips are mowed in the fields; one possible strategy would be to mow alternating strips over a three- to five-year rotation, which would also help to keep the fields in a grass/shrub condition.

In 2010 researchers began investigating overall habitat use by woodcock and how long individual birds remained during autumn in the Cape May area. Starting in the last week of October, the biologists tried to capture and radio-mark up to 10 woodcock per week. By the first week of December, they had caught 67 birds and attached radio transmitters to 57 of them. As of 23 December, about half of the birds had migrated south, and more than 25 were still in the Cape May area.

Funding for these research and monitoring efforts came from the U.S. Geological Survey, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Region 5, Moosehorn National Wildlife Refuge, and the Wildlife Management Institute, with logistical support from New Jersey Division of Fish and Wildlife and Cape May National Wildlife Refuge.

How to Visit

For more information on young-forest habitat projects in southern New Jersey, contact New Jersey Division of Fish and Wildlife biologist and land manager Laurie Pettigrew, 856-785-0592, Laurie.Pettigrew@dep.state.nj.us; Lee Widjeskog, Regional Superintendent, Bureau of Land Management, New Jersey Division of Fish and Wildlife, 856-785-0455, ltwidjeskog@yahoo.com.; and Jean Lynch, Stewardship Project Director – South Region, New Jersey Audubon Society, 609-861-1608 x 24, jean.lynch@njaudubon.org.

For information on New Jersey wildlife management areas, including maps showing parking areas, see http://www.state.nj.us/dep/fgw/wmaland.htm.

New Jersey Audubon Society (http://www.njaudubon.org/) is an important partner in creating young-forest habitat in this region.