Good Morning Gloucester

It’s been another unseasonably cold and wet week for the Good Harbor Beach Piping Plovers (and all of we humans, too!). This morning, April 29th, at 5:45 am it was 36 degrees, and I nearly lost my balance on the unexpectedly frost-covered footbridge.

Crickly creek frosty morning at Good Harbor Beach

On the few warmer days we’ve had, the PiPls are courting and mating, but on freezing cold, wet, and windy days, they hunker down in divots and behind mini hills in the sand, and that’s exactly where I found them this morning. We should be seeing eggs any day now; perhaps Mama is just waiting for the weather to turn a bit warmer.

Hunkering down in sandy divots during cold, windy weather

The issue of dogs running through the roped off nesting areas has greatly subsided, thanks to the ordinance change, to increased enforcement by our dog officers Jamie and Teagan, to Piping Plover monitor presence over the past month, and to the bold new signage. We can see very clearly how fewer dogs on the beach has affected the plover’s behavior. Unlike the first two and half weeks of April where there were still many, many dogs on the beach, the PiPls are only occasionally seen in the parking lot.

Thank you to Gloucester’s awesome DPW crew, who in anticipation of the past weekend’s running race, encircled the plover’s nesting area with sawhorses and police tape.

We have seen a total of FIVE different Piping Plovers at Good Harbor Beach over the past two weeks, our mated Mama and Papa pair, the Bachelor, ETM (the banded PiPl from Cumberland Island, Georgia that Heather Hall spotted), and a mystery fly-by-night female.

We were hoping the new girl would stay long enough to strike up a piping conversation with the Bachelor, but she flew in for a one night stopover and has not been seen since. She was very distinctly pale, with only the faintest head band and collar band.

Fly-by-night female

There is one bit of troublesome news to share and that is someone had a bonfire within the roped off nesting area. The police chief and and the federal agent assigned to Good Harbor Beach have both been made aware of the bonfire.

We are grateful and thankful to all who are helping the PiPls successfully nest, especially those who are using Gloucester’s alternative locations to walk their dogs.

Photos from PiPl check 4-29-19

Papa

Mama

Bachelor

Sawhorses and police tape in the parking lot, with thanks to the DPW staff