Here we are a couple months into winter with several cold snaps already that have dropped temperatures into the high 20’s for a few hours.
According to local weather forecasters these temperatures are below normal for us but the question is “What is normal?” I can remember the 1980’s on Cumberland when we would get prolonged pipe busting hard freezes several times every winter. In 1983 over Christmas the temperatures went down to twelve degrees and stayed near that for three days. On Christmas in 1989 there was four inches of snow on the ground and it also lasted for about three days. So, at best, our winter weather is erratic but usually pleasantly cool and as I have noticed, getting warmer.
However, cold fronts much further north have sent a great number of migratory birds our way: numerous shore birds like dunlins, sanderlings and red knots are affected by these weather changes.
The 2500 acres on the north end of the island that burned last summer are also attracting a lot of birds. Some of the grasses that quickly recovered after the fire have already gone to seed. So seed eating birds like sparrows and mourning doves are thick in these areas now.
The fire has also changed the locations of quite a few feral hogs as they moved into areas farther south where they were more accessible to hunters. Yet, many survived the public hunts this season and are now rooting up the main road and surrounding forest as they feed. Hogs are not only a blight on Cumberland, but thirty eight states in the country are having serious problems with them. It doesn’t look like there will soon be any changes to the better when it comes to controlling this invasive animal.
Some of the even more dynamic changes on Cumberland however have occurred along the island’s shoreline. There is a significant current that runs from north to south along Georgia’s coastal islands. Sand transported by the current will naturally build up on the north end of an island while sand from the southern end is carried southward to the next island in the group. On Cumberland, a two mile long jetty was built on the south end in the 1890’s to stabilize the St. Marys inlet for ship traffic. However, the jetty also interrupted the long shore currents transport of sand southward to Amelia Island. As a result, Cumberland has gained many acres of new ground on its southern end while Amelia Island has lost shoreline on its north end. So Cumberland is adding more sand at both ends but over the last quarter of a century since I’ve been here, has lost at least twenty yards into the shoreline over nearly a four mile stretch of beach in the middle of the island. The lesson here is that shorelines along the southern Atlantic coast are very active and it’s hard to figure out what they are going to do in the future. Also, things people do on one island can affect another island somewhere else. On Cumberland there has never been any ocean front development. But on other islands where people are allowed to build on beaches their fortunes often turn around rapidly when the sea starts to work against them.
Probably the most dramatic changes I’ve seen on Cumberland have been along the main dunes and adjoining interdune meadows. Heavy grazing from cattle years ago in the meadow areas exposed sand to the wind “allowing” large migrating dunes to form. Prevailing easterly winds moved the dunes inland covering and killing trees while also filling in some of Cumberland’s unique fresh water wetlands. In the 1970’s the cattle were removed and many of the locations that were impacted by the loss of interdune plants have recovered remarkably as the movement of sand has slowed. Now the main thing keeping these habitats from a full recovery are the free ranging feral horses that are still grazing in some sensitive areas. But I will leave them for another blog…
A more recent significant change to the island comes in the form of an exotic beetle from Asia. The ambrosia beetle was first introduced into the shipping port of Savannah by accident about three years ago. Since then, it has attacked red bay trees up and down the coast throughout the range of these trees. Entomologists have no practical way of stopping the beetle which is attracted to the sweet smell of the red bay. Scientists believe we could see the extinction of these trees in the not too distant future and then the beetle may move into other plant species. The red bay is a very common tree on Cumberland and many of them have already been killed. With these trees gone, no one really knows how the rest of the island’s forest will be affected, but it certainly will be changed.
Today, with a heightened public awareness of environmental changes, I thought I would pass on some of the changes here on Cumberland. But one can also see how closely related the island is to outside forces, both natural and man made. Never the less, this National Seashore remains to be one of the most scenic areas on the east coast.
