Popham Beach by Beginning with Habitat
© Heather Perry 100_0013
At over 400 acres, Popham Beach State Park and the adjacent Hunnewell Beach (private) serve as nesting habitat for piping plovers (Charadrius melodus) and least terns (Sterna antillarum). Nearby Pond Island, protected by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, has served as a restoration site for roseate terns (Sterna dougallii). Popham Beach State Park also has small remnant pitch pine woodlands and a coastal dune/marsh ecosystem with a dune grassland.
This area was home to the Popham Colony, the first organized attempt to establish an English colony in the region known today as New England. The colony was planted at the mouth of the Kennebec River in the summer of 1607 and lasted for just over a year, until it was abandoned in the fall of 1608.
