Life Gets Wild Under High Wires

Maryland has just gotten a little friendlier to wildlife.
    Six right of ways beneath power lines carrying electricity generated at Calvert Cliffs Nuclear Power Plant are now Certified Wildlife Habitats. Certified Wildlife Habitats can be our backyard, cities, public spaces and now utility easements. Baltimore Gas and Electric, which manages the property, is the first utility on the green list.
    You know what these right of ways look like: They’re clear-cut strips running under high-tension power lines. You may not have known that they “offer great wildlife habitat” — so says National Wildlife Federation’s David Mizejewski.
    “Even though they are periodically mowed to keep them from transitioning into forests with large trees that would interfere with power lines, they are generally otherwise left wild,” Mizejewski explains. “In fact, by periodically mowing them, utility companies ensure that they remain in a meadow ecosystem filled with native grasses, wildflowers and low-growing shrubs, which support a diversity of wildlife.”
    “One success story is our work on the approximately 200-acre right of way within the Patuxent National Wildlife Research Refuge,” says BGE’s Bill Rees. “Our observations have shown an increase in native bee, butterfly and bird species as our efforts have led to increased populations of native herbs and forbs that provide nectar and expanded populations of native shrubs that provide berries.”
    Another of the newly certified right of ways is within the American Chestnut Land Trust, from Dares Beach Road to Parker’s Creek in Calvert County.
     Greg Bowen, director of the American Chestnut Land Trust, likes what BGE is doing. “The utility line divides a very large, protected area along the Chesapeake Bay under management of the American Chestnut Land Trust,” he says. “By allowing native vegetation, such as grasses, wildflowers, shrubs and trees, the utility is providing shelter for birds, pollinators and other wildlife.”