It seems like every other year or so, Plovers get tangled up in the crosshairs of people’s personal issues and agendas. Disinformation then becomes widely shared and treated as fact. The latest round of misinformation resulted because of the facts that were reported in the GDTimes about the City investigating how to mitigate flooding on Thacher Road. I can’t speak to that project, which I know nothing about other than what was reported in the Times. I can however try to correct all the tall tales that have subsequently been written on social media sites regarding the Piping Plovers at Good Harbor Beach.
Piping Plovers began nesting at Good Harbor Beach in 2016. At that time, the beach was in a deplorable state due to severe storms and lack of ecological management. Here is a photo from around that time. Please notice the exposed rebar which was all that remained from failed dune fencing. People recreated right up to the base of the dune, behind the rebarb, and thought nothing of traipsing through. Each year the dunes receded further and further.
That first year they nested, the Plovers tried a number of times and each time the eggs and chicks were either squashed or predated. You can read more about the history of Plovers at Good Harbor Beach here Plover Love Story for the Ages #ploverjoyed
I am not going into the entire history here but I would like people to really understand exactly how Gloucester’s citizens have benefitted from helping to protect a threatened and endangered species. We, like many coastal towns across the Commonwealth, are part of a several decades long effort to prevent an animal from going extinct. When you stop to think about that it’s really remarkable that because of these grand efforts, the Plovers are making a comeback in Massachusetts. That is not the case in all of its breeding range but we are succeeding in helping the Plover population recover here in our state.
If the PiPls recovery alone is not enough, think about the dramatic change that has taken place at Good Harbor Beach. Notice in the photo below where the rebar you see in the above photo is nearly buried, you can just see the tips. People ask all the time how can that be in under ten years? Because the dunes want to be healthy. They ask well maybe we should plant beach grass plugs at our beach to help restore the habitat. NO, you don’t need to do anything other than provide a modicum of protection from foot traffic and pets. Now look at the next photo and see how lush and sturdy the dunes at Good Harbor Beach have become.
The vast, vast majority of our GHB beachgoers are delighted with the Plovers and could care less about the seaweed on the beach. Thank you good Citizens of Gloucester for being excellent Plover Protectors!
The following are several of the questions we Plover Ambassadors are often asked —
- Why don’t Plovers nest in trees like other birds? Plovers are ground nesting birds, like Wild Turkeys, ducks, geese, swans, other shorebirds, Puffins, and a number of species of songbirds. Within an hour of hatching, Piping Plover chicks can feed themselves. They run on the ground pecking for insects and tiny sea creatures, just as you might see a domestic chicken’s chick pecking for food on the ground.
- Why don’t Plovers nest in the dunes? Over millennia Piping Plovers evolved instinctively knowing that the safest place to nest is on a sandy beach. Why? Because the eggs, chicks, and adults are perfectly camouflaged. They share the soft weathered grays and tans of sandy beaches. Dunes are rife with predators, including mice, rats, skunks, snakes, foxes, and coyotes. This safety in camouflage all changed during the previous century when people began recreating on beaches in much greater numbers.
- Will the Plovers stay in the roped off area once they hatch? No. They may for a few days but after that, the chicks roam far and wide, from the dunes to the shoreline.
- Then why do we have to keep the symbolic roping in place? The Plovers have learned that roped off areas are, for the most part, safe from human foot traffic. Plover chicks are teeny, about the size of a marshmallow, and are very easily and inadvertently squished. They often rest in the roped off areas during the day when the beach is packed with people and they can’t get to the shoreline for food. It’s like their “home base.”
- If the Plovers are feeding themselves, why do they need Mom and Dad? Until about a week before they can fly, Plover chicks cannot self-regulate their body temperature. They need Mom and Dad to provide warming snuggles. Equally as important, Mom and Dad are their chief protectors. They are really good at sounding the alarm for the chicks to stay absolutely still when a predator is nearby. The parents will fly after, and even latch onto the wings of predators like Great Black-backed Gulls, which are 10 times at least their size!
- Why doesn’t the City rake the beach? The City has to submit a beach management plan to the State before raking can resume.
In all the photos below you can see how beautifully the Plovers are camouflaged at every stage of life in their natural habitat, and why they haven’t evolved to nest in lush green dunes.
