A Delaware company wants to mine sand and gravel on a parcel of farmland and forest along Marshyhope Creek on Maryland's Eastern Shore - a proposal that is raising alarm among conservationists who fear the operation will destroy rare wetlands, harm endangered species and ruin bird habitat.
The Horsey Family LLC is asking Dorchester County this week for a zoning exception so it can excavate soil, sand and gravel from the property and create an "open-water lake."
Workers would then float a hydraulic dredge into the lake and extract the remaining mineral resources, according to an application filed with the county last month.
The Horseys' attorney, William "Sandy" McAllister Jr., said the mining work would provide construction material to fuel the state's building boom. He says the family has been in the sand and gravel business for two generations and will be "just as careful and sensitive in this case as they always are."
But environmentalists are worried that the operation would destroy a diverse ecosystem of amphibians, birds and wetlands in one of the Shore's most pristine forests.
"It's really pretty shocking, with respect to the potential impact on a whole myriad of resources that are on that property," said Liz Zucker, director of the Nature Conservancy's Eastern Shore Project.
Ecologists with the state Department of Natural Resources are also concerned because the area is habitat for the endangered Delmarva fox squirrel.
County officials, too, have questioned whether the property - a 392-acre tract east of Cambridge, near where Marshyhope Creek meets the Nanticoke River - is suitable for an industrial operation. More than half of the land is in the state's Critical Area, protected because of its proximity to a Chesapeake Bay tributary.
"I just think it's a terrible waste of our land," said County Councilwoman Effie Elzey. "In the middle of the Critical Area is going to be a hole in the ground. It may mean income now, but for generations to come, it will be worthless land."
The county Board of Appeals is scheduled to hold a hearing on the matter Thursday. If the plan is approved, the Horseys would also need a surface-mining permit from the state Department of the Environment.
For natural resources officials and environmental groups, the biggest concern is that the open-water pit would be just 25 feet from a very rare wetland ecosystem known as Wades Savanna. It is the only known wetland of its kind in Maryland and one of only seven in the world.
