Riverkeeper Network: Dredging could hurt horseshoe crabs

[Donna]

Four million cubic yards of material the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers wants to dredge from the shipping channel at the mouth of the Delaware Bay would be used to restore wetlands on Kelly Island and be used for beach replenishment at Broadkill Beach, corps spokesman Edward Voigt has said.

Maya van Rossum, who heads the Delaware Riverkeeper Network, said the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and environmentalists have expressed concern that the beach nourishment project would harm horseshoe crabs that spawn on Broadkill Beach.

She said the hearing officer from Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control’s hearing on the corps’ plan agreed, and said the local horseshoe crab population would be directly and adversely affected by the project.

Migratory shorebirds, including the threatened red knot, feast on horseshoe crab eggs, a crucial food source, in the Delaware Bay each spring as they migrate north.