To the Editor:
I am writing to the Guilderland planning and town boards.

Thank you for sharing the Bagdon Environmental Endangered Species Screening Report.

I was pleased  to see a fairly comprehensive list of plants, indicating a plant survey was done. Thank you very much.

There were several inaccurate statements about vegetation however. As we all know, the Pine Bush is made up of pitch-pine scrub-oak barrens as well as wetlands and patches of forest.

Because an area is forested does not make it “Not Suitable Pine Bush Habitat.” In fact, the courts have ruled that even inland pine barrens are inland pine barren habitat, even if the species which could live there are not currently present. This means that an area that is contiguous or even non-contiguous to other Pine Bush that is populated with rare species especially warrants protection.

Additionally, the first page refers to three days of site visits. While we appreciate those visits, they do not allow for a comprehensive analysis. They have not taken a “hard look.”

One reason we know they were not adequate is that, while the page does say with no proof that there are not and could not be rare bats on the land, they did no nocturnal bat study. On a similar patch of Pine Bush, not more than two miles away, it was established that rare bats species were present as of last year. 

Those species were the little brown bat and the Indiana bat. The Indiana bat is federally and state endangered and the little brown bat is a bat of Special Conservation Need, under review for listing.

While the Indiana bat has been endangered in federal and state law for decades, the little brown bat and all Myotis species are recently endangered due to the pressures exerted by an epizootic, popularly known as white-nosed syndrome.

We also found hoary bats, red bats, silver-haired bats, and big brown bats on the land, after a developer survey — far more extensive than this one — stated there were no bats onsite. Additionally, both northern long-eared bats (threatened) and Indiana bats are known to have hibernacula in our area, so their presence is far from unexpected.

This survey is not just incomplete but entirely deficient with respect to its analysis of rare mammals.

Additionally, rare insects, rare reptiles, rare amphibians and rare birds were not surveyed. We have no lists for any of them.

In order to accurately answer the questions on the Environmental Assessment Form, these studies would need to be done. The developers would have to obtain a mist-net permit and use anabat acoustic recorders; they would have to do bird observations and bioacoustic bird studies. They would have to use cover boards to search for the eastern worm snake found less than a mile away; nobody can say whether it was on this site or not.

It is disturbing to read that there are a number of oaks of different species on site but nobody looked for the rare inland barrens buckmoth. I do not see any list of invertebrates at all!

It is disturbing that, although the Pine Bush hosts a variety of grassland birds, one of the only areas of suitable habitat for these birds whose numbers are increasingly plummeting, the site was not surveyed for birds. It is fairly outrageous that the eastern whippoorwill, which has been extirpated from many areas of New York State but still breeds in the Albany Pine Bush, was not surveyed.

It is extremely disturbing that nobody surveyed for the eastern spadefoot toads. These are among the rarest reptiles in the whole northeastern United States, according to the Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection.

The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation states that this is a species of special concern in New York State, although many professional wildlife biologists agree that it will be listed as endangered within a few years.

While we cannot know what is actually on this site or breeding on this site without an adequate wildlife survey, we do know the law requires adequate wildlife surveys.

This is the main reason we believe the law also requires a full Environmental Impact Statement for this piece of land and any proposed development there.

We ask you to comprehend the significance of the jewel you have sitting in the middle of Guilderland.  These 5,000 acres of extant rare ecosystem, the surviving acreage, which at one time was upwards of 50,000 acres, is the only type of habitat these rare species and the rest of the 70 rare species that need the barrens can live in.

There are reasons for this. Acidic sandy soil conditions are rare. Fire-controlled ecosystems are rare. The Pine Bush contains an outrageously high concentration of plants that are obligate hosts for rare species.  These species cannot just up and move.

While we want low-income residents, a category I have qualified for, to also not need to move from the area, they are, at least, able to move to a different spot within Albany County. There are many large parts of Albany County that would benefit from development dollars and would be excellent places for humans to live and thrive. Many are areas that are easier, more accessible, and less expensive to live in.

Please prepare a full Environmental Impact Statement; that is, please restore the positive declaration that the site was erroneously robbed of long ago, in view of this land’s status as needing full protection by the decision of the entire Albany Pine Bush Commission, a body in which the Guilderland town government is represented.

Thank you for your attention to the law.

Grace Nichols

Save the Pine Bush