The New England-Acadian Forests Ecoregion (NA0410) (see the link for a map and a short description) covers an enormous area extending from southern Québec and the Maritimes south through Maine to Connecticut. It represents a transition from northern and colder coniferous ecoregions to warmer more deciduous areas to the south. France and I spent the Labor Day weekend visiting Sylvie and Tom in the northernmost part of the ecoregion – in the Eastern Townships of Québec. During a gorgeous fall weekend, we had some excellent birding, recording about 50 species. That included a locally uncommon Great Egret (photo below), spotted by Sylvie, and surfing some of the season’s last warbler waves; in a period of 10 minutes I saw my all-time favorite duo of bird species – a Nashville Warbler and a Tennessee Warbler!
But you are anxious for me to get to the birds and the bees part…
Back in the 1980s Roxanne Quimby and Burt Shavitz founded Burts Bees company in Maine, selling candles made from beeswax. In 1991 they added a beeswax lip balm to their catalogue which to this day is their biggest seller. I’ve never bought lip balm in my life but I guess a lot of other people have, making the company a tidy fortune.
Roxanne is an ardent conservationist and starting in the 1990s acquired major tracts of nearly pristine habitat in her native Maine – east of Baxter State Park and in the heart of the New England-Acadian Forests Ecoregion. This area has major populations of mammals such as bear, moose and lynx and an excellent representation of the birds of the ecoregion most dependent on extensive tracts of undisturbed habitat. Her goal was to see it created as a national park, to be gifted to the US Park Service, along with $40 million for maintenance. You would think that a gift with a value of about $100 million to the US people would have them licking their lips, but no, not exactly. Some local communities opposed the idea of a park as did local politicians, and state politicians fell into line. Typical of problems facing new protected areas everywhere in the world, local communities feared loss of future economic development options (logging), loss of their own access rights, and federal intrusion. Roxanne’s son Lucas St. Clair took over and after years of consulting, cajoling, and convincing, had to finally recognize that this was a park that was not to be.
An American president does not have the unilateral authority to create a national park. However, as a Plan B, (s)he can designate a national monument. Two weeks ago, on August 24, 2016, President Obama designated these 35,000 ha of Maine as the Katahdin Woods and Waters National Monument. It will benefit from long-term protection, no logging will be allowed, but its status will allow certain forms of local access to resources such as hunting, fishing, and snowmobiling. Overall this was a reasonable compromise that had been worked out and it ensures the protection of this area, which may well be the last major new protected area that will be created in the eastern US.
The National Monument was created to celebrate a special day, August 25, 2016, the 100th anniversary of the US National Parks System. Fittingly, 100 years ago Woodrow Wilson similarly designated the Sieur de Monts National Monument, also in Maine, which a few years later became Acadia National Park, the first US national park east of the Mississippi. Bon anniversaire to the oldest park system in the World!
Very interesting to see how a National Monument came to be and how a National Park did not happen. It is a good thing that there are committed people in this wolrd. The”BEES” I see this product in most stores but I have never purchased it. I will get some now !
The bird photos are fantastic – so beautiful. A very interesting outing.