Agency recommends survey of rare, endangered species

RICHMOND — Special swamps? Special shrews?

It's possible, says one state agency, that rare and endangered species and habitats exist on or near the 220 acres where Highland New Wind Development is building an industrial wind utility.

Monday, project review coordinator Rene Hypes, of the Division of Natural Heritage, Department of Conservation and Recreation, sent a letter to the State Corporation Commission attorney Wayne Smith saying her agencies special ecologists should survey the project area to help the developer avoid damaging rare species.

The SCC issued HNWD a state permit for its project in December 2007, but required final site plans be submitted to reviewing agencies. The SCC's final order also required HNWD "comply with conditions as recommended in DEQ's report dated June 30, 2006," Hypes said.

One of the conditions includes protecting natural resources during construction by adopting recommendations made by the Department of Environmental Quality, the Department of Game and Inland Fisheries, and the DCR.

Though the site plan was revised several times, especially with regard to wetlands areas not previously shown, and not approved until Aug. 3, Hypes said her division searched its "Biotics Data System" with information from the first site plan sent to agencies June 12.

Staff looked for natural heritage resources in the project area, "defined as the habitat of rare, threatened, or endangered plant and animal species, unique or exemplary natural communities, and significant geologic formations," she said.

Two conservation sites

There were two areas of concern because they were identified as "conservation sites" near the project. Such sites are:

• Tools for representing "key areas of the landscape that warrant further review for possible conservation action because of the natural heritage resources and habitat they support";

• "Polygons built around one or more rare plant, animal, or natural community designed to include the element and, where possible, its associated habitat, and buffer or other adjacent land thought necessary for the element's conservation"; and

• Are given a "biodiversity significance ranking based on the rarity, quality, and number of element occurrences they contain, on a scale of 1-5, one being most significant," Hypes explained.

"According to the information currently in our files," she said, "the Laurel Fork Tributary Conservation Site has been documented southwest of the project area. It is ranked as a B5 site, which indicates it is "of general significance," and contains the Southern water shrew.

"DCR supports the previous VDGIF recommendation for having a qualified biologist conduct a formal habitat assessment for the southern rock vole and Southern water shrew at the crossings of Laurel Fork to determine potential impacts," she said. "To minimize adverse impacts to the aquatic ecosystem … DCR also recommends the implementation of and strict adherence to applicable state and local erosion and sediment control/ storm water management laws and regulations."

North of the project area, Hypes noted, is the Bearcamp Knob Conservation site, ranked B3, which means it is of high significance.

Its natural resources include drooping bluegrass, ground juniper, and purple oat-grass.

"Drooping bluegrass typically occurs in mesic, open hardwood forests with little understory and a dense fern layer," she explained, adding it is known from 11 occurrences and one historic occurrence in Virginia.

Ground juniper is a evergreen shrub in thin soils along streams, rock outcrops and mountain summits, high elevation old fields, and dry coastal plain sandhills, she said, noting it is known from four locations in Virginia's coastal plain and ridge and valley provinces. "Historically, it has been identified at scattered locations in the piedmont and Blue Ridge physiographic provinces," she added.

Rare purple oat-grass is found in open woods and grassland, she said, and is known from only four places in the state.

"Please note," she added, "the pearly everlasting has also been historically documented in the project vicinity."

Since these plants have been documented within a half-mile of HNWD's project, and the area "appears potentially suitable" to support those species, the agency recommends an inventory be taken. "With the survey results we can more accurately evaluate potential impacts to natural heritage resources and offer specific conservation recommendations for minimizing impacts to the documented resources," Hypes wrote.

Special swamps

Furthermore, she said, DCR vegetation ecologist Gary Fleming noted the forested wetlands bordering power line crossings on the June 12 version of HNWD's site map might be a globally rare type of "high-elevation seepage swamp," which contains "saturated, coniferous or mixed forests of gently sloping stream headwaters, large spring seeps, and ravine bottoms at elevations above 3,000 feet," she explained. "These communities are locally scattered in the higher mountains of western Virginia on various geologic substrates and soils, almost all of which are strongly to extremely acidic."

The habitats in such swamps feature "pronounced hummockand hollow microtopography, with braided streams, muck-filled depressions, and lush bryophyte cover," she wrote, adding that Eastern hemlock, yellow birch, and red maple are the most common trees, but locally, red spruce or eastern white pine may also exist.

The "shrub layer" in the swamps might have hollies, blueberries, great laurel, mountain laurel, speckled alder and witch hazel, she added. Herbs can include marsh marigold, several types of sedge, slender wood reed grass, asters, and ferns.

"Communities in this group are naturally rare due to the scarcity of flat or gentle, wet habitats in the higher Appalachians," she said.

DCR recommended an inventory in the area so it can offer specific conservation suggestions to minimize impacts.

"DCR-Division of Natural Heritage biologists are qualified and available to conduct inventories for rare, threatened, and endangered species," she noted.

Bats in danger, too

Hypes also pointed out that bats in the area are at special risk now due to White Nose Syndrome, a disease that has killed tens of thousands of bats in the Northeast. The syndrome was found this year in neighboring Bath County, and two other places in southwest Virginia, and has affected bats in the project area, she said.

"With the likely spread of this disease into other areas … and expected mortality due to this disease, it has become even more important to minimize impacts to bats from other sources including air pressure related mortality associated with interactions with the blades of wind turbines, and direct collision with wind turbine equipment," she said. "Impacts to bat populations due to WNS and wind turbine interactions could be extremely detrimental, and may take decades to recover due to the slow reproductive rate of bats.

"Therefore, DCR recommends extreme vigilance in reducing mortality to bats at this site, and utilize any and all methods of deterrence as this technology is developed to avoid impacts to migrating and resident bats," Hypes said.