Mount Pleasant Magazine Jan/Feb 2021

29 www.ReadMPM.com | www.MountPleasantMagazine.com | www.VOICEofMPpodcast.com designated it a seabird sanctuary in 2006, establishing it as one of only five such protected nesting areas along South Carolina’s coast. This prohibited people from being on the island from March 15 to October 15 during bird nesting season. According to Nolan Schillerstrom, a coastal program associate with Audubon SC, Crab Bank was selected because it provides an environment particularly well-suited for seabird breeding, historically attracting species like brown pelicans, black skimmers and royal terns, as well as some shorebird species including American oystercatchers and Wilson’s plovers. At its peak, Crab Bank hosted upward of 5,000 nesting birds, “which is pretty significant,” stated Schillerstrom. “It’s literally National Geographic wildlife in our own backyard.” He attributed its past breeding colony success to several factors: the island has remained undisturbed by people, is unreachable by land predators that would ransack the nests and provides an abundant food source nearby. By 2018, rising water levels, large boat wakes and wash-overs from storms had mostly depleted the once approximately 20-acre island, and birds stopped nesting for the first time since 1979, the first year it was high enough to be used as a breeding site. Once signs of erosion appeared, conservation groups didn’t want to see this special place lost. An opportunity to save Crab Bank arose with the Charleston Harbor Deepening Project, which aims to deepen the shipping channels to 52 feet by 2021. Audubon SC worked with SCDNR, CEF, the Coastal Conservation League (CCL), South Carolina Wildlife Federation and the Army Corps of Engineers Charleston District on determining how to restore Crab Bank using dredge material. The deepening project’s dredging contract now includes an option to “allow the placement of approximately 660,000 cubic yards of sediment within the historic footprint of Crab Bank” in lieu of depositing the material in an EPA-approved disposal area offshore. The total project restoration cost is $377,000, and the local cost share required fundraising 35% of that figure, or $132,000. Conservation groups devised a strategy to make Crab Bank a reality by establishing the South Carolina Coastal Bird Conservation Program (CBCP), an SCDNR- managed fund that can receive donations, draw interest and help finance critical projects to protect coastal birds. Their funding goal was achieved primarily through a National Fish and Wildlife Foundation grant, written by Schillerstrom, in addition to donations from businesses like Boeing and BP, private individuals and students, including $675 contributed from a Moultrie Middle School fundraiser. The Corps is supplying the remaining around town GRAND OPENING! AmazingNailsSpa.com 20% OFF MANI & PEDI EXP 02/28/21 1200QueenboroughBlvd., SteD Mount Pleasant, SC 843-666-8899