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Photo © Jack Bartholmai
Piping Plover (Charadrius melodus), listed as Endangered in Wisconsin, prefers large isolated cobble beaches on the shores of Lakes Michigan and Superior. The required avoidance period is May 15 - July 30.
A partnership to restore these tiny shorebirds to Wisconsin and contribute to the endangered Great Lakes Piping Plover population is making slow but steady progress. Efforts over the past 20 years in Wisconsin to protect nesting areas and monitor survival and migration of Piping Plover chicks has resulted in chicks being produced every year for the last decade, a second nesting site found in 2016, and a project soon underway to restore habitat at a DNR site near Superior [PDF].
Piping Plover chicks hatched in Wisconsin and elsewhere in the country where the shorebirds are endangered are fitted with metal or color bands on their legs. These unique color combinations help biologists readily tell where and when the birds were banded, allowing them to track the birds survival and movements, information that aids recovery efforts.
Report a banded piping plover in the Great Lakes region [exit DNR]
The table below provides information about the protected status - both state and federal - and the rank (S and G Ranks) for Piping Plover (Charadrius melodus). See the Working List Key for more information about abbreviations. Counties shaded blue have documented occurrences for this species in the Wisconsin Natural Heritage Inventory database. The map is provided as a general reference of where occurrences of this species meet NHI data standards and is not meant as a comprehensive map of all observations.
Note: Species recently added to the NHI Working List may temporarily have blank occurrence maps.
| Summary Information | |
|---|---|
| State Status | END |
| Federal Status in Wisconsin | LE |
| State Rank | S1B |
| Global Rank | G3 |
| Tracked by NHI | Y |
| WWAP | SGCN |
Piping Plover (Charadrius melodus) has very few known occurrences in the state and is of the highest priority for conservation; we encourage you to consult with your District Ecologist or an NHI Zoologist for specific recommendations for your site.
Identification: Piping plovers are tiny shorebirds that inhabit sandy beaches where vegetation is sparse. Plovers have light sandy-gray colored back feathers, white underparts with a white wing stripe, a pale-orange, black-tipped bill and pale-orange legs. Both male and female piping plovers look alike. During the breeding season, they have a distinctive black stripe on their forehead and lower neck. In the winter, they lose these black stripes and their bill and legs become dark.
Although plovers are small and hard to see because they blend well with their surroundings, they make their presence known by their clear, soft song. Piping plovers earned both their common and scientific names from their melodious "peep, peep, peep, peep-lo" song and their two-note alarm call, "peep-lo."
Habitat: Piping plovers inhabit shorelines of lakes, rivers and oceans.
State Distribution:
Piping plovers once nested along the shores of all the Great Lakes but habitat loss, recreational pressure and predation and contaminants likely contributed to serious declines.
By 1948, only one pair of plovers was known to nest in Wisconsin (in Door County).
With help from federal, state and local partners, the number of breeding pairs along Wisconsin's Lake Superior shoreline has increased to five or six breeding pairs and these pairs have produced (fledged) 94 chicks over the last decade that have fledged. And for the first time in 75 years, piping plovers successfully nested in 2016 along the shores of Lake Michigan in Lower Green Bay and fledged three chicks!
Global Distribution: Piping plovers breed along the western Atlantic Coast from Newfoundland to North Carolina, around the Great Lakes and on the northern Great Plains. During breeding season they prefer open sandy beaches along the Great Lakes. In Wisconsin, the only breeding pairs in recent years have occurred along the shores of Lake Superior. Plovers winter along the coasts of the Gulf of Mexico, the southern Atlantic states, the Bahamas and the West Indies. They migrate alone or in small groups of five to six. frequenting inland lake areas and ponds along the way.
In 1985, only 476 pairs nested along the entire Atlantic Coast of the United States. The largest number of piping plovers (fewer than 1500 pairs) exists in the Great Plains, but these populations are endangered by dam projects and other water development plans. The 500 pairs of piping plovers once known to nest in the Great Lakes region dwindled to only 18 by 1986. The species no longer breeds in southern Ontario, where 100 pairs used to nest, or in Ohio, Indiana, Illinois and now, Wisconsin. Populations in Michigan and Minnesota also have declined substantially.
Rationale for Species Listing and Threats: Habitat loss and disturbance of birds and their nests caused by human activities are the main causes of piping plover declines throughout the bird's range. Vehicles, pets and beach development have been large contributors to losses in breeding habitat and reproduction on remaining habitats nationwide. "Beaches everywhere have been appropriated for, commercial and recreational development. Cottages and hot dog stands occupy the plover's former nesting sites, beach buggies crush its eggs and young, while even raking the beach for trash scoops up the eggs," (Graham, 1986). The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service reports an increasing incidence of plover nests being raided by unleashed and feral dogs and cats, as well as skunks and raccoons that are attracted to beaches by human development. Channelization and damming of rivers destroys sandbars where plovers nest, and rising water levels in the Great Lakes have eroded previous nesting beaches.
Diet: The plovers' diet includes grasshoppers, spiders, chironomids, fly larvae, beetles, crustaceans, mollusks and other invertebrates.
Life and Natural History: Wisconsin's piping plovers spend the winter along beaches in the southern U.S. By mid to late April, they fly north to nest on our state's beaches and sandpits. Plovers are very site tenacious and return year after year to the same nesting territory. If humans also return to use the same strip of beach each year, as is often the case, the plovers' nests may be repeatedly destroyed and the birds will continually fail to rear any young.
Males arrive first, establish territories and defend them from other males. When females arrive several weeks later, the males begin their courtship displays. They try to attract a mate by flying in circles and figure-eights, and by as well as dancing with tail and wings spread, while whistling and rapidly drumming their feet.
More than one pair of plovers will nest on the same beach, but pairs generally nest 100 yards or more from each other. Both the female and male make several nest scrapes in the sand. They use of which only one is as a nest, however, lining it lined with pebbles, shells or bits of driftwood and used as a nest.
During mid-May, the female lays one cream-colored egg with black spots every other day until there are four in the nest. The eggs are well-camouflaged and are easily stepped on by unwary beachcombers. If plovers lose their eggs during the first half of the nesting season, they may relay. But if their eggs are lost late in the season, they do not nest again that year.
Both female and male incubate the eggs, which hatch after 24-31 days. The chicks are precocial; they spending only a few hours in the nest, waiting for their feathers to dry, and then are ready to run. They leave the nest under the watchful eyes of the adults. Adults don't feed their young directly, but guide the chicks to good food sources, where the young feed themselves.
The downy young plovers have protective coloration similar to the adults. If an intruder appears, the adults call out to the chicks, who respond immediately by freezing, lying flat and motionless on the ground. The chicks are almost impossible to see when they are still. The parents also may act as if they have a broken wing to draw the attention of an intruder away from the chicks. After 21-35 days, the young are ready to fly. Adult plovers leave Wisconsin in mid to late summer; juveniles often depart later.
Only one in five piping plovers reaches the age of five years. Some may live longer, however, as evidenced by one bird that was banded, released, then recaptured 14 years later.
Additional Information: In 1973, the piping plover was placed on the National Audubon Society's "Blue List," a list of endangered bird species. Plovers were placed on Wisconsin's Endangered Species List in 1979 and on the Federal Endangered Species List in 1985.
Management Guidelines:
Concerted restoration efforts by the National Park Service, Bad River Band of the Lake Superior Chippewa, DNR, U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service and The Nature Conservancy are paying off at the Lake Superior piping plover nesting site along the Apostles Islands National Lakeshore.
The National Park Service and Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa work together to protect piping plovers and their nesting habitat. In recent years, the Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa has overseen the plover monitoring effort. Plover monitors are stationed on the island during the breeding season to keep track of how many breeding pairs are present and their nesting status, protect nesting areas from disturbance by people through visitor education, and place wire cages over the nests so the eggs are not eaten by predators like raccoons, coyotes and red fox. DNR leads efforts to place color-coded bands on the birds' legs so that they can be tracked in coming years to learn more about their survival, their migration routes and their habitats.
Since one key to protecting piping plovers is to keep people away from nesting areas, the cooperation of shoreline owners and beach visitors is essential. Dogs, people and off-road vehicles (ORV's) not only scare the birds off their nests, which can expose eggs to boiling hot sun, but can accidentally step on or run over eggs and chicks. Such actions could wipe out Wisconsin's piping plovers in one afternoon. To ensure that piping plovers will continue to nest in Wisconsin and elsewhere, suitable nesting habitat must be protected. Each of us can assist the future of Wisconsin's piping plovers by avoiding areas where plovers are known to occur during the May 15 – July 15 nesting season.
Click to view a larger version. Please considering donating a photo to the Natural Heritage Conservation Program for educational uses. Photo use
Piping Plover nest
Photo by Sumner Matteson, WDNR.
Piping Plover
Photo © Gene Nieminen.
Photo © Jack Bartholmai.
The Piping Plover is extremely rare in Wisconsin where it nests only on undeveloped beaches along Lake Superior.
Photo © Jack Bartholmai.
Photo © Jack Bartholmai.
The table below lists the natural communities that are associated with Piping Plover. Only natural communities for which Piping Plover is "high" (score=3) or "moderate" (score=2) associated are shown. See the key to association scores for complete definitions. Please see the Wildlife Action Plan to learn how this information was developed.
| Natural community | Score |
|---|---|
| Great Lakes Beach | 3 |
| Great Lakes Dune | 3 |
The table below lists the ecological landscape association scores for Piping Plover. The scores correspond to the map (3=High, 2=Moderate, 1=Low, 0=None). For more information, please see the Wildlife Action Plan.
| Ecological landscape | score |
|---|---|
| Superior Coastal Plain | 3 |
| Central Lake Michigan Coastal | 2 |
| Northern Lake Michigan Coastal | 2 |
| Southern Lake Michigan Coastal | 2 |
Ecological priorities are the combinations of natural communities and ecological landscapes that provide Wisconsin's best opportunities to conserve important habitats for a given Species of Greatest Conservation Need. The 10 highest scoring combinations are considered ecological priorities and are listed below. More than 10 combinations are listed if multiple combinations tied for 10th place. For more information, please see the Wildlife Action Plan.
* Ecological priority score is a relative measure that is not meant for comparison between species. This score does not consider socio-economical factors that may dictate protection and/or management priorities differently than those determined solely by ecological analysis. Further, a low ecological priority score does not imply that management or preservation should not occur on a site if there are important reasons for doing so locally.
Conservation actions respond to issues or threats, which adversely affect species of greatest conservation need (SGCN) or their habitats. Besides actions such as restoring wetlands or planting resilient tree species in northern communities, research, surveys and monitoring are also among conservation actions described in the WWAP because lack of information can threaten our ability to successfully preserve and care for natural resources.