The next time you walk among the longleaf pines of Hitchcock Woods or the Aiken Gopher Tortoise Heritage Preserve, keep an eye out for falling flakes of pine bark. Often this, or a sharp squeak heard intermittently, provides the only clue that a rare, white-cheeked bird known as the red-cockaded woodpecker occupies the area. Even if you never spot this surprisingly-elusive species, a satisfaction comes from knowing that it inhabits a particular natural area in this region. Few better measures for the health of our fire-adapted pine forests exist.
Red-cockaded woodpeckers are unique among North American woodpeckers in that they nest in living trees. Over the span of several years, the birds peck their way into mature pines that have been infected with heart rot, which makes the job of creating a nesting hole, known as a cavity, much easier. Typically, the woodpeckers do not construct cavities in trees younger than about 80 years-old. These days, that’s a problem.
Old pines in our area have become uncommon and so have the birds that depend upon them. Red-cockaded woodpeckers, in fact, were among the first birds listed as endangered under the Endangered Species Act. The loss of mature pines, coupled with the loss of the open understories that red-cockaded woodpeckers prefer due to a lack of fire, led to their near-extirpation in Aiken County at one time.
Today, the situation has improved. Thanks to the restoration of prescribed fire to natural ecosystems and the protection of longleaf pine sandhills, red-cockaded woodpecker populations have grown in the areas where they hung on in the lean years. These populations have provided a source of birds to be reintroduced to other habitats that are again suitable for these important, if picky, birds. To aid efforts to reintroduce birds to new areas, biologists install artificial cavities into mature pines that save the birds from having to spend years making the cavities themselves. The effort has worked, and red-cockaded woodpeckers were downlisted from federally-endangered to federally-threatened last year.
ALC plans to do its part to help recover this “ecosystem engineer” on property it owns. Boyd Pond Park, of which ALC owns 92 acres and leases to Aiken County, was burned for the first time this past January. The burn, and the work currently underway by ALC and Aiken County to expand the park by 25 acres, led us to discuss red-cockaded woodpecker recovery efforts with MPJ Wildlife Consulting, who works with the red-cockaded woodpeckers recovery efforts at Hitchcock Woods. Boyd Pond Park sits between several populations of red-cockaded woodpeckers and, because they don’t like to fly over large areas of unsuitable habitat, could serve as a bridge for the birds between different blocks of occupied habitat.
Thanks to the incredible support of the community, ALC has begun to move forward with the project. MPJ Wildlife Consulting will conduct required baseline surveys and a timber assessment, make habitat improvements, install artificial cavities at Boyd Pond Park, and annually monitor those cavities for signs of the birds. ALC, in partnership with Aiken County, plans to continue to burn at Boyd Pond Park every 2-3 years. Hopefully, in a couple of years, red-cockaded woodpecker will call Boyd Pond Park home.
Augusta-Aiken Audubon Society awarded ALC $500 from their Doug and Alice Walker Conservation Grant, Dominion Energy granted $2,500 towards the work, and Savannah River Nuclear Solutions generously gave $5,000 towards this effort. This work would not be possible without this level of community support and we hope you will consider joining these partners to support this project. We, and the red-cockaded woodpeckers of our area, thank you!