Snowy plovers produce record nesting season
Thursday, November 18, 2004 7:38 AM PST
By Eric Apalategui
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E-mail this articleWestern snowy plovers, a protected shorebird, took another step toward recovery this year with some of the best nesting success ever measured on beaches in Oregon and southern Washington.
In Oregon, plover nests produced 107 fledglings that survived to become independent from their parents, easily trumping last year's former record of 60, according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
In Washington, the northern tip of the snowy plover range, saw similar rates of improvement. In the state, 27 chicks survived to fledge from their nests.
Scientists have been monitoring nest success only since 1990, three years before the pale-colored birds were listed as "threatened" on the federal Endangered Species List.
About two-thirds of Washington's snowy plovers nest on the Long Beach Peninsula.
Willapa National Wildlife Refuge staff and volunteers improved nesting habitat for some of those birds near Leadbetter Point. They placed donated oyster shell on the beach to help disguise nests from predators and removed invasive European and American (East Coast) beach grasses that carpet the open areas where plovers nest.
Those efforts were successful and will expand in 2005, said Charlie Stenvall, project leader for Willapa and nearby refuges.
"We've got plans to really push the restoration area. We're really going to aggressively go after it this (coming) year," Stenvall said. "If you have the right habitat, things seem to work out the way they're supposed to."
Some nests at the Willapa refuge and in Oregon also were enclosed in wire to protect them from predators, but Stenvall said that approach needs more study after mixed success at Leadbetter Point. Good weather and cooperation from beach visitors also improved nesting success throughout the Northwest, U.S. Fish and Wildlife officials reported.
The coastal population of snowy plovers ranges from southern Washington and Baja California.
Throughout their range, plover numbers have plummeted due to loss of habitat from human development and non-native grasses; other human disturbances; and predation of nests by raccoons, ravens and non-native red foxes.
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