From the mouth of the Maumee River to the shores of Sandusky Bay, the shallow western end of Lake Erie supports one of the Great Lakes\u2019 most important coastal wetland landscapes for birds. Waterfowl\u00a0gather\u00a0here in tremendous numbers, with typical wintering flocks\u00a0containing\u00a0up to tens of thousands of diving ducks, and Trumpeter Swans have been successfully introduced here after local extinction. In addition, Western Lake Erie serves as an important breeding ground; hundreds of Bald Eagles nest in this region, and the coastal marshes are hot spots for breeding and migrating rails and bitterns, including what may be the only\u00a0viable\u00a0breeding population of King Rails in Ohio.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
However, Ohio has lost over 90% of the wetlands that once covered the state. As those vital ecosystems disappear, marsh birds are experiencing steep population declines. Additionally, the intensive agriculture in the Maumee Bay watershed causes serious water quality issues, resulting in annual toxic algal blooms that severely impair local drinking water supplies and damage important wildlife\u00a0habitat.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
In response, Audubon is collaborating closely with Ohio\u2019s Coastal Management Program and other partners to restore large wetland complexes in the region. Much of this work is supported by H2Ohio, a program arising from the Ohio state government\u2019s commitment to improve the quality of water entering Lake Erie.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Since launching, H2Ohio has helped restore or enhance over\u00a016,000 acres\u00a0of wetlands.\u00a0Today, scientists and conservationists are studying how vulnerable marsh birds are responding to these restoration efforts, how restored wetlands are\u00a0impacting\u00a0the region\u2019s water quality, and how best to ensure the protection of these critical habitats so that birds and communities across the Lake Erie shorelines can thrive.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Partners in this region include\u00a0Black Swamp Bird Observatory, Ducks Unlimited, Ohio Coastal Management Program, Ohio Department of Natural Resources, Nature Conservancy of Ohio, Toledo Metroparks, Toledo City Parks, Ohio State University,\u00a0Wright State University\u00a0and\u00a0Winous\u00a0Point Marsh Conservatory.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"From the mouth of the Maumee River to the shores of Sandusky Bay, the shallow western end of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":265230,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[136,138,137],"class_list":["post-265229","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-erie","tag-erie","tag-erie-headlines","tag-erie-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/265229","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=265229"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/265229\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/265230"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=265229"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=265229"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=265229"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}