Western Snowy Plover adult male and chick. Photo from ODFW.
Some encouraging news to pass along this afternoon. The Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife says the Western Snowy Plover had a very good summer along the Oregon Coast. In some ways, it was the best summer since monitoring began in 1990.
Back then, wildlife officials found only 50 adult plovers along the shore. This past summer, they counted at least 201.
The bird is listed as a threatened species under federal and Oregon law. A long time ago, Western Snowy Plovers were numerous and widespread. But much of their habitat has been ruined by development and an invasive European beach grass.
Since the birds like to nest in sandy beach areas, it’s easy for people to disturb them. If you’ve ever seen sections of the beach cordoned off with signs and flags, that’s done to protect snowy plover nests.
ODFW says beach visitors do a good job of respecting the signs, and it’s one of the reasons why the numbers of snowy plovers are rebounding.
A banded chick. Photo from Bureau of Land Management
“This year’s data is really encouraging. It appears that the work we’ve been doing with habitat and predator management is helping,” says Dave Lauten, wildlife biologist with Oregon State University. “A lot of the thanks has to go to beach visitors who help out by observing signs and leashing their dogs to give plovers space to successfully nest and rear their young.”
While this year’s adult numbers are very strong, ODFW also says this past summer was hard on the chicks. 106 of them made to adulthood, a survival rate of about 33%. In 2008, only about 70 chicks survived, but that was one of the worst years on record.
