Massive project restores Pocomoke River wetlands

Hidden away in a forest of trees, surrounded by the calming sounds of nature, is something you would never expect.

"This is the largest restoration project in Maryland's history." 

It doesn't look like much passing by, but these full swamplands filled from the 73 mile long Pocomoke River are what wetland biologists have been waiting for since 2010. 

"It was just as dry as can be out here and it just looked odd, cypress are supposed to be flooded during high water tables so it was hard to see them sitting dry," explains Maryland Department of Natural Resources wetland biologist Erin McLaughlin. 

The Pocomoke River now has over 100 breaches or rather cut outs. To the average person it just looks like flooded land, but in reality this is exactly what it should look like.

"I'm standing in a breach that was constructed in 2017 here off the Pocomoke River. We constructed these breaches to help with water quality and increase habitat," says Mike Dryden, project manager for Nature Conservancy. 

Restoring thousands of acres of floodplains that were destroyed back in the 1940s when they straight- lined the Pocomoke River.

That's the goal behind this massive multi-agency project.

"In a functioning natural system, a stream comes up and spreads out over its flood plains. At high water a lot of our streams are so ensized and cut off from their flood plain that they just go up and down in the channel and so you get no treatment that way," says McLaughlin.

But with these manmade breaches, varying in size from 100 to 175 ft., are cutting back river bank erosion and more importantly reducing the sediment that flows all the way down to the Chesapeake Bay. 

"It's not going to the Chesapeake Bay, that's why these breaches are put here and so it has the opportunity to sit there versus going straight out through the system into bay and the tributaries to the bay,"  Dryden continues, "It's creating great water quality, habitat. I've seen an increase in waterfowl back here prior to what we did prior to the construction." 

Even though this massive project has been ongoing for over three years, there's still a lot of work left to do.

The Nature Conservancy first placed breaches in parts of the river that were public land, but they are now looking to tackle private land along the waterway. 

There's another 16 cut outs that will be constructed over another 200 acres that will be restored this summer. 

But in order to do that, the Nature Conservancy had to go door to door making sure they had the permission from landowners. 

"As large as this project is, we need each land owner because due to parcel sizes your neighbor could be affected based on the restoration that we're doing on your property, so in order for them to be able to go into the program their neighbor would as well have to come in," explains Dryden. 

So far they have 80 percent of land owners on board, either signing ten year restoration agreements or a perpetual easement.

The main reason these private land owners support the project is because it's good for them and will relieve some of their flooding concerns.