O'Connere Reservoir, Moosic Mountain Preserve

It would take more than a camera with a panoramic lens to capture the complete picture of the Central Appalachian Mountains which span West Virginia, Maryland, Virginia and Pennsylvania.

But for a snapshot, climb with Bill Kittrell to the top of Virginia’s 4,229-foot Warm Springs Mountain. Scrawny pitch pines at the mountain’s rocky peak offer a faint smell of turpentine, and their stunted growth allows the sun to warm your face. “You have a 360-degree view for miles,” says Kittrell, director of conservation programs for the Conservancy in Virginia. “What I see, perched atop that mountain, is this vast, undulating landscape of rich forests with an extraordinary mosaic of greens created by the variety of trees—oak and pine trees, yellowwood and basswood.

“Then, you look down at your feet and see all these herbs and other small plants, like Gray’s lily, that have evolved to live here,” he adds. If you were standing atop that mountain with Kittrell, you might also hear the raspy cry of hawks as they circle the mountaintop, or the sounds of thousands of migratory birds, either nesting in the forest or passing through.

The scene is repeated up and down the stony spine of the Appalachians as they begin near Pennsylvania’s Moosic Mountain, northeast of Scranton, and continue south through the Dolly Sods Wilderness in West Virginia and Maryland’s Green Ridge State Forest to Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley and beyond.

In these forests and barrens, barred owls, bobcat, black bear and fisher also thrive in a variety of forest types filled with unusual plants, many of which are found nowhere else on Earth. The forests shelter cool headwater streams that provide clean water to larger rivers like the Susquehanna, Potomac and Rappahannock, sources of drinking water and recreation for millions of people in the East. The Central Appalachians also harbor mountain ponds, bogs, barrens and numerous caves, all of which provide unusual natural communities for many species.

The rugged topography and varied geology, the range of altitude, and the fact that the area was never covered by glaciers have led to plant and animal diversity that is matched in very few places on the planet, explains Nels Johnson, director of conservation programs for the Conservancy in Pennsylvania.

“More variety in species of trees, flowers and shrubs, and as a result more species of everything else—birds, mammals, butterflies,” Johnson says.

Central Appalachian Threats

Some of these rare features and species are found in the many Conservancy preserves throughout the region: Cranesville Swamp, which straddles the West Virginia and Maryland border, the Warm Springs Mountain Preserve in Virginia, and Pennsylvania’s Aitkin Cave. But these places can’t stand on their own if they become isolated by threats such as unrestrained development.

And such threats are increasing.

With major East Coast cities just a few hours away, the mountains are popular for second home development.

West Virginia has the fastest rate of second home development in the continental United States, explains Rodney Bartgis, the state director of the Conservancy in West Virginia. “Vacation homes bring deforestation, roads, invasive species and other problems,” Bartgis says.

In addition to development concerns, the region is central to the nation’s energy debate. Many parts of the region already suffer damage from coal mining. Fossil fuel alternatives, such as wind, could play a large role here, because the ridge tops of the Central Appalachians offer abundant wind—often in areas that also are critical to conservation. And there are several proposals to extend new power lines from the energy-hungry East to the coal-burning power plants of the Midwest—cutting transmission corridors through the heart of the mountains.

“It’s important for us to use all the information we have available to inform decision makers about where potential conflicts are, to minimize the conservation impact,” says Johnson.

Looming large on the horizon is the changing climate, high on the list of threats because of the profound way in which climate change can affect the rarest species, Kittrell says.

“Some of these plants and animals are already just hanging on to the tops of the mountains—they won’t be able to keep a toehold if it warms up too much. They’ll have no place to go.”

Cross-Boundary Solutions

In recent years, the Conservancy’s work has become more focused and collaborative as scientists in the four Central Appalachian states have recognized the common themes and are working together across state lines toward similar goals.

Several states are working with the U.S. Forest Service and state forest managers to change forest management practices to focus more on diversity and to introduce controlled fire to forest communities that depend on it. They’re lobbying to increase state funding for forest protection, and to develop policies to fight nonnative invasive species and insects— pests that target native forest species.

In some states, the Conservancy is targeting unique natural communities that harbor unusual species. In Pennsylvania, the Conservancy has recently focused on protecting a 50-mile band of vernal pools along South Mountain. These intermittent wetlands, which form in spring and usually disappear by late summer, are significant strongholds for amphibians that are some of the world’s most threatened species, including a halfdozen species of salamanders that breed only in these pools.

Other Pennsylvania projects include protecting and restoring barrens at the tops of ridges, and working with nearby states to assess and protect the most valuable and vulnerable caves in the ecoregion.

The challenges facing the region are great, but by working with partners, we can protect the complex diversity of the Central Appalachians for nature and people of the East.

And while the stakes are high, the payoff could be huge, says Donnelle Keech, Allegheny Project director for the Conservancy’s Maryland chapter.

“The Central Appalachian region is a little slice of wilderness at the doorstep of one of the most populous places on Earth,” says Keech. “This is a last stand for wilderness.”

Reprinted with permission from The Nature Conservancy PA Penn’s Woods newsletter.

2/29/2008