The beach at the Parker River National Wildlife Refuges closes each year for the piping plover nesting season, reopening when the birds are done with it.
August 19th was my first visit since late March. Only the tips of the beach were open, from parking lot 2 to the north, and from parking lot 6 to the south. The rest of the beach was still owned by the birds.
An email titled "end-of-season plover update for volunteers" that I received on Monday triggered me to check the web site. I found that the birds had returned the beach to allow sharing by people - it was time to head to the refuge for a beach walk.
For anyone interested in the nesting season statistics, here is this year's statement:
I'm writing with a final plover update for the 2020 season. This year we had 34 or perhaps 34.5 pairs of piping plovers. (I think one male lost his mate early on and re-nested with a different female, hence the half-pair.) This is well below last year's record high of 50 pairs, but preliminary reports indicate that the plover population increased statewide this year. And although we had fewer pairs of plovers on the Refuge this year, productivity (chicks fledged per pair) was above average, with a total of 44 fledglings.
