HIgh Profile Bird Nesting At Sauble
Sauble Beach became an even more special place last week, with the discovery of a nesting pair of Piping Plovers. OMNR and CWS are taking this VERY seriously, and the nesting site now has an exclusion fence (to keep gulls and other predators from eating the egss) as well as round-the-clock observation by naturalist volunteers and governmental organizations.
This bird is highly endangered - the last time it was found nesting anywhere in southern Ontario was at Oliphant 35 years ago.
From OMNR's Natural Heritage Information Centre's website: One of the most celebrated species, Piping Plover, formerly nested along the dry sandy beaches and dune flats at Long Point, the Toronto Islands, Hamilton Beach, Burlington Bay, Point Abino, Rondeau, Point Pelee, Wasaga, Oliphant and Carter Bay. It is now only found in very small numbers (one pair in 1997) in the extreme southwest of the Rainy River area. Increases in human traffic, predators (notably gulls), and shoreline development have been implicated as causes for this species' decline..
Apparently the birds are from a Michigan breeding program as both male and female are banded. There are four eggs in the nest. Let's hope the chicks survive into adulthood and that the Piping Plover will continue to make the Sauble area its home, once again!
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Plover Photos?
Perchance the Piping Plover Paparazzi have pix to proffer?
Here's the pic
The security is so tight with the reputation of the paparazzi now a days that I've attached a stock photo.
Dan O.
Pics
I'll be nest-sitting on Sunday, so I'll take some snaps (digiscoping) and post them here next week.
Plover pic
A pic of the exclosure used to protect the nesting pair of Piping Plovers and their nest of four eggs, and a horrid pic of one of the plovers sitting on the nest. sabrinus does not have fancy camera equipment and one cannot get closer than 30 metres so this is all ya get!
How DO you fence a plover?
Thanks for the pics, I think they turned out just right, certainly as good as any shot we ever got of Princess Margaret topless.
But having seen it, now I'm curious: How do you go about erecting an enclosure like that without terrifying the poor mama-bird and frightening her away? Obviously whatever they did works, but how is it done? Just wait for mama to go for lunch and snap it up before she gets back?
PIPL info
I've scanned and "PDF'd" the Piping Plover at Sauble information brochure. You can download it
right here.
The fenced-in area is technically called an "exclosure". We want to prevent egg and future chick predation from area predators such as gulls, fox, raccoon, rats, etc.
There is a small rectangular-shaped ingress/egress opening for the male and female PIPLs to use.
The male and female "take turns" egg-sitting (roughly every three hours there is a change of egg-sitter). There were no eggs at the time the exclosure was built, hence both brids were not present when the exclosure fence was hastily installed by a crew of people. It was constructed very quickly. Then the perimeter tape barrier was put up.
This is a joint effort by OMNR, Canadian Wildlife Service, and many volunteer helpers from Sauble and surrounding areas. We need more volunteers, so if any Peninsular readers would like an opportunity to "nest sit" for a few hours, call the number(s) provided on the provided information pamphlet PDF.
We had an incident last Saturday night where some young drunken boys were shooting fireworks at the exclosure around 10:30 pm. When they entered the restricted area, a watchful resident yelled at them and they ran away. Idiotic behaviour! We'll have round-the-clock monitors onsite for the July 1 long weekend.