WASHINGTON, D.C. - U.S. Senators Olympia J. Snowe (R-ME) and Susan Collins (R-ME) announced today that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has awarded the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife a coastal grant of $453,000. The money, along with another $305,000 put forth by Maine Coast Heritage Trust, Ducks Unlimited, and an individual landowner, will help to purchase 122 acres of land, including the 62-acre Thomas Island in Hancock County , in order to protect the coastal and island habitat for bird species.
"This is a very important land and wildlife conservation project for Maine . If we are to preserve our valuable natural treasures, we must continue to support these essential programs with the funding they so rightly deserve," said Senators Snowe and Collins in a joint statement.
This Thomas Island Habitat is a crucial area for numerous bird species in the processes of foraging, migrating, breeding, and wintering. The Thomas Island habitat will also buffer and thus contribute to the biological integrity of the Maine Coastal Island National Wildlife Refuge, which itself comprises nearly 50 offshore islands, as well as three coastal parcels, for a total of more than 7,400 acres of protected land.