North Carolina Reserve

Currituck Banks - North Carolina Reserve

Flora (Plant Life)

The Currituck Banks area represents a transition between the Virginian and Carolinian biogeographic provinces. Plant species indicative of this change are sea oats (typical of the southern areas) and American beach grass (found to the north and around the great lakes), which grow together on Currituck dunes. General plant communities of the site include grass-dominated dunes, shrub thicket, maritime forest, freshwater marsh, brackish marsh and submerged vegetation in the sound.

Fauna (Animal Life)

Currituck is located within the Atlantic Flyway, attracting accipiters, falcons, ducks, geese, warblers, gulls, terns, herons and egrets. Indigo buntings, bobwhites and other mainland species also use the islands for nesting. The site has particular significance with respect to waterfowl. Currituck Sound harbors an estimated six percent of the Atlantic Flyway overwintering waterfowl population and 32 percent of North Carolina's wintering fowl. Typical types of waterfowl include dabbling ducks, diving ducks, geese, swans and coots.

Currituck Sound contains a rich resource of forage, commercial and game fish. Largemouth bass, yellow perch, striped bass, tidewater silverside and pumpkinseed fish are the ecologically dominant species. Other game fish found in the area include white perch, bluegill, black crappie, chain pickerel and channel catfish. Carp, shad, herring and eels are also found in the area. Mammals include muskrats, river otters and minks, as well as deer, gray foxes, raccoons, opossums, nutrias and feral hogs. Occasionally, feral horses graze or pass through the site. Mole crabs, ghost crabs and coquina clams among other invertebrates are common in the site's intertidal zone. Common fish include striped bass, bluefish, mullet, croaker, spot and weakfish.

Endangered Species

Four federally-listed threatened or endangered species and 63 species recognized by state biologists as endangered, threatened or of special concern are found at this site. Bald eagles and piping plovers are seen occasionally, but are not known to nest in the area. Peregrine falcons migrate through the Banks in the fall. Scattered nest sites for loggerhead turtles, federally-protected, threatened reptiles, are also found in the Currituck Banks site.