Frostburg State University Athletics

MT. SAVAGE, Md. - On Saturday, April 24, twenty football players and five coaches from the Frostburg State University football program volunteered with the Georges Creek Watershed Association (GCWA) and the Maryland Department of the Environment (MDE) to promote the Appalachian Regional Reforestation Initiative (ARRI) using the Forest Reclamation Approach (FRA).

In this special regional initiative, the GCWA partnered with the Appalachian Coal Country Watershed Team (ACCWT) and the Office of Surface Mining (OSM) to enlist the River 5 team of 10 AmeriCorps National Civilian Community Corps (NCCC) members.

Working together, the FSU football program, NCCC River 5, ACCWT, GCWA, MDE/BOM and OSM, planted approximately 4,500 native seedlings on seven acres of previously grass reclaimed surface mine land on Federal Hill in the Jennings Run Watershed.

To initiate the Forest Reclamation Approach the GCWA received a $3300 grant from the American Bird Conservancy. Using the Forest Reclamation Approach (FRA) by “ripping” the compacted mine sites with heavy equipment, increases the survival and growth rates of the high value hardwood and expedites the establishment of forest habitat through natural succession.

Forest-dependent bird species in the Appalachian Mountains have been declining in recent decades. Reforestation of minelands previously reclaimed to grasslands will help “buffer” larger tracts of forest in the short term by reducing edge effects, and will create larger blocks of mature forest habitat in the long term.

Priority birds that rely on early successional habitat may also benefit during the first several years of this planting.