Tag Archives: Salt Island Piping Plover Family

2021 WILD CREATURES REVIEW!

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Wishing you peace, love and the best of health in 2022 – Happy New Year dear Friends. I am so grateful for blog, Facebook, and Instagram friendships, new and old. Thank you for your kind comments throughout the year.

I would like to thank our wonderfully dedicated volunteer crew of Piping Plover Ambassadors, who provide round-the-day protections to one of Cape Ann’s most tender and threatened species.

I wish also to thank you for your kind support and contributions to our Monarch documentary, Beauty on the Wing: Life Story of the Monarch Butterfly. 2021 was a fantastic year for the film, winning many awards, including honors at both environmental festivals and awards at family-oriented film festivals, We also had a very successful fundraiser that allowed us to re-edit the film, and to distribute Beauty on the Wing through American Public in order to bring to the widest television audience possible.

Please stay healthy in the coming year. Wishing all your dreams come true. To peace, love, and great health in 2022. <3

 

Cape Ann Wildlife – a year in pictures and stories

Thinking about the wonderful wildlife stories that unfolded before us this past year I believe helps provide balance to the daily drone of the terrible pandemic. 2021 has been an extraordinarily beautiful and exciting year for our local wildlife. Several are truly stand out events including the three pairs of Piping Plovers that nested on Cape Ann’s eastern edge, the most ever! The summer of  2021 also brought a tremendous up take in Monarch numbers, both breeding and migrating, and in autumn a rare wandering Wood Stork made its home on Cape Ann for nearly a month. The following are just some of the photographs, short films, and stories. Scroll through this website and you will see many more!

January 2021

A rarely seen in these parts Black-headed Gull (in winter plumage), a Horned Lark, American Pipits, Red Fox kit all grown up, and an illusive Snowy Owl living at Gloucester Harbor.

February 2021

A red and gray morph pair of Eastern Screech Owls, flocks of winter Robins, and snowshoeing and snow sledding Snow Buntings grace our shores. 

 

March 2021

Bluebirds return to declare their nesting sites, the raptors delight in songbirds’ returning, American Wigeon lovebirds, signs of spring abound, and the Good Harbor Beach Piping Plovers return on March 26th, right on schedule! Gratefully so, Gloucester’s DPW Joe Lucido and crew install PiPl fencing on March 29th!

April 2021

Ospreys mating, Cedar waxwing lovebirds, Ruby-throated Hummingbirds return, and the Plovers are nest scraping and courting. The early spring storms also brought a dead Minke Whale to the shores of Folly Cove. 

May 2021

The Good Harbor Beach Killdeer family hatches four chicks, beautiful new PiPl on the block, many PiPl smackdowns with three pairs vying for territory, eggs in the nest at Area #3!, warblers and whatnots migrating, Make way for Ducklings – Cape Ann Style, the Salt Island PiPls have a nest with eggs but it is washed away by the King Tide of May 29th, and Cecropia Moths mating and egg laying.

June 2021

Piping Plover ambassadors first meeting of the season, on June 9th the Boardwalk #3 PiPls hatch four chicks, one chick perishes, Super Mom has a foot injury, Horseshoe Crabs at Good Harbor Beach, Piping Plover Ambassador badges from Jonathan and Duncan, a second nest is discovered at Salt Island with a new pair of parents (the first was washed away in the storm surge during the May King Tide), and for the first time, Piping Plovers are nesting at Cape Hedge Beach.

SEE PART TWO, JULY – DECEMBER, TOMORROW!

 

ALL GOOD NEWS TO REPORT FROM GOOD HARBOR BEACH!

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#3 Dad in the morning blue hour, finding lots of mini mollusks

The morning after the thunderstorm found both Piping Plover pairs doing remarkably well. I was super concerned about the full moon/storm combo tide because the beach is much narrower at the Salt Island end. Although the tide did rise to nearly the edge of the exclosed nest, nothing was damaged and the PiPl parents are seemingly unfazed.

Gloucester DPW’s Steve and Pat Marshall from Marshall’s Landscape Supplies were there bright and early.  Pat is using the Bobcat to smooth the pathways through the dunes. FYI, I was talking to Pat about his landscaping and composting business. Did you know you can bring your large brown bags of leaves and yard waste (absolutely NO PLASTIC flower pots, nothing plastic!). It’s only two dollars per bag, and you aren’t restricted to certain days.  Marshall’s Landscaping Supplies is located at 144 Concord Street in West Gloucester, phone number 978-281-9400, and you can visit their website here: Marshall’sSteve and Pat Marshall

This is the fourth time in the past two week that I have seen Glossy Ibis foraging in the tidal marsh at Good Harbor Beach. They are stunning, with plumage ranging in shades of rich chestnut to iridescent emerald green. 

Cape Ann is located in the northern range of the Glossy Ibis breeding grounds and each year I feel we see more and more.

JOYFUL NEWS TO SHARE! PIPING PLOVER WEEKLY UPDATE MAY 24

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Dear Friends of Gloucester Plovers!

Such great news to share – the young family at the Salt Island end, the area we call #1, has a nest with (currently) three eggs!! We’re keeping our hopes up for a fourth egg. We now have two pairs of Plovers nesting at Good Harbor.

This morning Essex Greenbelt’s Dave Rimmer and his assistant Adam Phippen installed the wire exclosure around the nest. Exclosures protect shorebird eggs from 95 percent of avian and terrestrial predators, as well as from stray balls, pets, and people walking through the symbolically roped off areas. We can all breathe a collective sigh of relief once the exclosures are installed. We’re so fortunate that Dave and his Greenbelt crew make themselves available to help protect the Piping Plover nests. Thanks, too, to Gloucester’s DPW crew who are always looking our for the PiPls.

Dave and Adam installing the exclosure at Salt Island

Would you like to be a Piping Plover ambassador? You’ll join a great group of wildlife enthusiasts and kind citizens. We are having an informational meeting on Sunday, June 6th, at 5pm at Good Harbor Beach, near the nest next to the #3 boardwalk. If you would like to help keep an eye on adorable Plover chicks at Gloucester’s most popular beach,  please contact me by leaving a comment or at kimsmithdesigns@hotmail.com. We would love to have you!

The beautiful pale Mom PiPl and her first egg

Dad fearlessly brandishing his wings at  Dave and Adam during the installation

Dad back on the nest within two minutes after the exclosure was installed

WE’RE GETTING CLOSE TO HATCH DAY – PIPING PLOVER AMBASSADORS ARE NEEDED DURING THE AFTERNOONS

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Hello Friends of Gloucester’s Piping Plovers,

Our Ambassador schedule is looking great for mornings and I am so appreciative of all who have volunteered to lend a hand.

We need Ambassadors during the afternoons. Please write at kimsmithdesigns@hotmail.com and let me know if you would like to volunteer for an hour a day for the next several weeks, possibly a month. The first week in a chick’s life is the most critical. When a chick reaches the 7 to 10 day milestone its chances of survival increase exponentially.

One hour old Piping Plover chick

We are meeting Monday, June 22nd, at 5:30pm, to go over any questions Ambassadors may have. We’ll meet at the the Saratoga Creek end of the beach, by the symbolic roping, on the Nautilus Road side of the beach, just after boardwalk #3. There should be no difficulty parking in the lot at that time of day.

I look forward to seeing familiar friends and meeting our new ambassadors. Thank you so much again for your willingness to help. Our new motto this year is Educate, not Enforce and our goal is to keep the energy positive and kind. Our City government is managing many, many issues due to the global pandemic and we do not wish in any way to add to their responsibilities.

Here is the schedule so far:

Kim 5am to 7am

Shelby  7am -8am

Jane Marie 8am -9am

Bette Jean 9am-10am

Jennie  11am to 12pm

Jonathan and Sally 5pm to 6pm

OUR SALT ISLAND PIPING PLOVER FAM HAS A SECOND EGG IN THE NEST!

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The most tenacious of Piping Plover pairs has a second egg in their nest!

For the next few days you may see them on and off the nest. The pair won’t start brooding full time until all the eggs are laid. The reason being is that the hatchlings are precocial, which means active from birth. The parents want the chicks to hatch as closely together as possible so the tiny rockets zooming around the beach are more easily managed. The difference in a PiPl day old hatchling and a PiPl week old chick in human years is like trying to look after a newborn and a precocious preteen simultaneously.

Salt Island Family Mom briefly on nest this morning.

SI Dad at the shoreline foraging at sunrise.

Piping Plovers take about a week to complete the nest and lay all their eggs (sometimes two eggs or three or five, but most often four eggs). If they started brooding one egg full time, that egg would hatch a week earlier than the last egg laid, which would spell disaster for a precocial chick. Observing PiPl chicks that had hatched twenty-four hours apart was hard enough on the parents, let alone a week apart!

If you stop by to see the PiPls on the beach, please bear in mind they are working hard at completing their nest and laying eggs. Please don’t hover around the roped off areas or when you see the birds on the shore. Trust me, hovering attracts gulls and crows. Both species are smart and I’ve seen over and over again how human interest in the PiPls  attracts these super predators to the nesting sites. Additionally, hovering around the adults off the nest stymies courtship and mating as well. Have a look with binoculars or take photo or two with a long lens and move on, especially when with more than one adult.

Thank you so much for your consideration!

Good Harbor Beach Salt Island Family Two Eggs June 16, 2020

Saratoga Creek Family Dad brooding this am

Sunrise and Crescent Moon rising today