Dear Ospreyers,

Over the past few months I have visited bird clubs throughout the Maryland-DC area to introduce Audubon's Important Bird Areas (IBA) Program, speaking at 13 of the 15 MOS chapters as well as all 5 Audubon chapters in our region. Many people have expressed interest in nominating a site - now I am happy to announce that the Important Bird Areas website is up and running! Here you will find an overview of the program, a list of IBAs identified so far (with ornithological summaries), IBA  criteria used to evauate nominated sites, nomination forms, and even a few bird photos by George Jett and others. Visit the Maryland-DC IBA website at:  http://www.audubonmddc.org/SciCon_IBAs.html  

The goal of the program is to protect and actively manage IBAs specifically for vulnerable species of birds, so that the network of IBAs across the state, and across all of North America, ensures that healthy populations persist. 

It is enormously helpful to the process of identifying IBAs if sites are nominated by people familiar with the site and its birds. This provides the ornithological data necessary to determine whether the site is of IBA quality, along with information on land use and ownership, habitats, and potential threats, that help to begin planning appropriate conservation measures. Please consider nominating an IBA. 

Site nominations are reviewed by the IBA Technical Review Committee, whose members are: Kyle Rambo (Chair),Patuxent River Naval Air Station; Wayne Bell, Washington College; David Curson, Audubon Maryland-DC; Lynn Davidson, Md. Department of Natural Resources; Matt Hafner, Maryland Ornithological Society; Peter Marra, National Zoo, Smithsonian Institution; Greg Kearns, Patuxent River Park; Glenn Therres, Md. Department of Natural Resources.  The Committee recently revised the IBA criteria to include numerical site-level thresholds for each species at risk. This is a great improvement over the former percentage-based thresholds, and should make it much easier for nominators to judge whether their site is likely to qualify as an IBA.  

This is the year to nominate a site, because our goal is to have all IBAs in Maryland and DC identified by 2007. We recommend a teamwork approach, because nominators will likely have to compile bird data from a variety of sources to document a site sufficiently for review. Data sources may include (among others): Christmas Bird Counts, Midwinter Waterfowl Surveys and other surveys coordinated by the Department of Natural Resources, site-specific surveys, and unofficial bird counts taken during club field trips, Atlassing fieldwork, or just daily birding. Some MOS chapters have already formed committees to compile IBA nominations, and this is a great way to coordinate the effort. 

If you have any questions about the IBA Program or the nomination status of a particular site please don't hesitate to contact me.

Dave Curson

David Curson, PhD
Director of Bird Conservation,
Audubon MD-DC,
2437 Eastern Avenue,
Baltimore  MD  21224
Tel: (410) 558 2473
E-mail: