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PELLSTON, Michigan—Sarah Foote prepares a dish of black worms and tiny crickets for the endangered piping plovers she’s nurturing—soft, white birds perpetually in motion.
Feeding occurs every three hours from 6 a.m. to 9 p.m. for the tiniest chicks at the Piping Plover Captive Rearing Center, requiring a collaborative effort. Foote, who oversees animal care at Potter Park Zoo in Lansing, has participated in the University of Michigan Biological Station project for 15 summers aimed at revitalizing the Great Lakes shorebird population following near extinction in the 1980s.
This season, they recorded an unprecedented 88 distinct nesting pairs—surpassing halfway to their target of 150 pairs. The Great Lakes once hosted nearly 800 pairs of piping plovers. By 1990, that figure plummeted to between 12 and 17, confined to just two of the state of Michigan’s Great Lakes.
“It’s fantastic to contribute to a conservation narrative that’s a Michigan conservation narrative,” Foote remarked. “I’m merely assisting these birds that wouldn’t have survived in the wild. This species is incredibly unique.”
Safeguarding piping plovers also protects other species they coexist and interact with, stated Aimée Classen, director of the U-M Biological Station and a professor of ecology and evolutionary biology.
“Piping plovers represent a key conservation initiative,” she noted. “We are observing drops in biodiversity worldwide, and this program aids in mitigating that decline. The presence of 88 breeding pairs signifies our achievements.”
The piping plover is the most prominent endangered species in the Great Lakes area, and its protection encompasses its nesting territories along the shores. Francie Cuthbert, professor emerita at the University of Minnesota and alumna of the University of Michigan, emphasized that, without the plovers, the shorelines would be further commercialized and developed.
“Anyone who has spent time at the Great Lakes appreciates how breathtaking many of the beaches are, and numerous pristine beaches still remain, attracting visitors for recreation, camping, hiking, and more. These locations are largely preserved due to the existence of piping plovers and their protected status,” she stated.
Renowned for their whistling call, adult plovers weigh approximately 1.7 ounces (around half a stick of butter) and boast a wingspan of 15 inches. They sport white and sand-hued feathers adorned with a black band around the neck and another on the forehead, along with orange legs and a black-tipped orange bill.
They nest on beaches that are also frequented by people and their dogs, which may disrupt the nesting birds. Predators, including merlins and ravens, also pose a threat. Approximately 40% of plovers nest at Sleeping Bear Dunes mainland and North Manitou Island.
“Piping plovers nest along the shoreline and adhere to traditional practices. They utilize locations that they inhabited a century ago. They seek specific traits in the landscape, including wide, firm beaches covered with smaller cobble, a certain distance from the tree line, often near a small stream flowing into the lake,” explained Cuthbert, who initiated the focused plover recovery, captive rearing, and re-release program over three decades ago at the field station in Pellston.
Since the program’s commencement, the team has augmented the number of nesting pairs and their habitats. Initially confined to Michigan’s two Great Lakes, they have now re-established colonies in Wisconsin, Illinois, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, and Ontario, Canada, stated Cuthbert.
The Piping Plover Captive Rearing Center is administered by the Detroit Zoological Society in partnership with the University of Minnesota and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Located along Douglas Lake in northern Michigan, the facility is staffed each spring and summer by avian specialists stationed at the U-M Biological Station to incubate and hatch abandoned Great Lakes piping plover eggs and nurture chicks to diminish extinction risks for this federally endangered species.
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species.
“Nurturing young birds requires considerable effort and there has been progress,” Cuthbert remarked. “Yet, the restoration of the population is quite sluggish. Numerous hazards and factors prevent the population from growing rapidly.”
Hazards in the nature
Each spring, piping plovers embark on their yearly journey north from their southern winter habitats in preparation for the forthcoming breeding season. Cuthbert noted that 25% to 30% of the piping plovers nurtured in captivity at the Bio Station and set free in the wild manage to return to the Great Lakes to mate post-winter. Over the years, Cuthbert’s team has liberated more than 400 birds.
Piping plovers create shallow nests on flat, exposed, sandy coastlines—the very same beaches that draw in people, their pets, and development.
Up to 28% of nests are deserted each season, often following the demise of a parent plover snatched by a predator or when high waters wash away a nest. Major predators include coyotes, skunks, gulls, crows, and birds of prey.
The initiative to save these small birds entails collaborating with numerous scientists and volunteers across six states and Ontario, two tribes, and various government bodies, all of whom assist in monitoring and tracking piping plovers.
Field observers keep watch over nesting. When an incident affects one parent, the remaining parent cannot incubate the eggs alone and leaves the nest. The eggs are then collected under federal permits and taken to the station where they are incubated, hatched, and raised until they can fend for themselves.
Raising the plovers
Zookeepers from various regions in the U.S. operate in two-week shifts at the U-M Biological Station to facilitate artificial incubation and rear chicks in a lakeside structure and safeguarded pens along the Douglas Lake shore until the birds are capable of flight and prepared for release into the wild along the Great Lakes.
The Detroit Zoo has supervised the rearing center’s function for 24 years, enhancing and expanding what Cuthbert and graduate students established from the ground up. Due to its knowledge in avian care and incubation, the zoo has developed methods to incubate abandoned eggs and subsequently nurture the chicks that emerge until they are ready to be returned to the wild. Piping plovers are capable of flying at the age of 25-35 days.
The field station in Pellston has a flight pen adjacent to the plover facility and training areas along the beach equipped with a pen surrounded by netting to give the growing plovers a secure environment to stretch their wings and explore the sand. They also hunt for fly larvae and small insects along the shore, while simultaneously getting acquainted with different weather conditions such as wind and rain.
Banding and flight
Prior to their release, each chick’s legs are equipped with a distinctive arrangement of color bands for permanent tracking.
Stephanie Schubel, the principal plover bander and field team leader for the Great Lakes population restoration initiative, is one of four University of Minnesota researchers based at the Bio Station. She is also an alumna of the University of Michigan.
The special banding arrangement on the bird’s legs is crucial for recognizing individuals at the breeding sites and also for volunteers and bird watchers who follow the plovers’ migrations down to the coasts of South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, and the Gulf states.
“It is vital that we ensure some form of protection at those wintering locations when we learn about them,” Schubel stated. “Because plovers spend nine months of the year there, while they are only here for approximately three months.”
Safeguarding Avian Species and Beyond
Following a record-setting year, researchers studying piping plovers are hopeful regarding the prospects for both the avian species and the ecosystems of the Great Lakes.
“I find them to be incredibly stunning birds. The chicks are absolutely adorable—so charming. However, it’s truly the Great Lakes coastline that I consider to be so remarkable and unique on a global scale,” stated Cuthbert. “It’s essential we safeguard it. The plovers represent the Great Lakes shoreline, and where they exist, other endangered species can also be found. As long as they are under protection, the areas where they breed are likewise safeguarded.”
This, in turn, benefits individuals residing in and visiting the Great Lakes region. They can experience and appreciate the natural surroundings of the coastal areas devoid of development or land practices harmful to the ecosystem, she noted.
Classen remarked that although a 30% success rate of the human-reared plovers returning to mate and lay eggs in their native habitats may not seem noteworthy, it’s comparable to the rate found in wild fledglings.
“That’s exceptional. Most conservation initiatives do not achieve success rates like that. We are indeed remarkable,” she commented.
Moreover, as more individuals observe piping plovers during their family vacations along the shorelines, it attracts their attention toward the surrounding ecosystem.
“I perceive piping plovers as a gateway to curiosity. You start with something that feels fascinating, beautiful, exciting, and endearing, and it opens up an entire realm of environmental awareness for students, residents of the area, and even the zookeepers who visit,” Classen explained. “And that introduces the broader scope of ecology and evolutionary biology, which is essentially our mission.”
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