A Special Plover
A few days ago I was in a familiar position of laying on my belly photographing shorebirds at Fort DeSoto. Among the plethora of Semipalmated Plovers, Least Sandpipers and Willets; a lone Piping Plover was foraging along the shoreline. I maneuvered my lens to get a few shots of it as it walked right past me. I did take note of how ‘accessorized’ it was with the bands and tags on its legs. After a few minutes, it moved well past me and my eyes moved towards other things.
Later that evening as I scrolled through my memory card I came across the Piping Plover again. I decided to post it to a Facebook page dedicated to banded birds that are found in Florida. Not long after I received a response from Alice Van Zoeren who works with the Great Lakes populations of Piping Plovers who told me a remarkable story of this particular plover.
This Piping Plover is the last chick of a well known Piping Plover from the Great Lakes population who was affectionately known as ‘Old Man Plover’, or BO:X,g. Old Man Plover was hatched in 2002 and had been migrating between Michigan and South Carolina where he wintered.That’s nearly 26,000 miles worth of migration! During his time he raised and fledged 36 chicks. Sadly, Old Man Plover disappeared this year during nesting season. 15 years is an amazing run for a Piping Plover. The diligent team that monitors the nesting sites saw that the nest had been abandoned and relocated the 4 eggs to a captive rearing station. Only one of the eggs was viable. However, the chick did successfully hatch and was banded B/OO:X,G in honor of its dad, BO:X,g.
Around the end of July the team released Old Man Plover’s last chick on the beach at Lake Michigan. Over the past few weeks, it has been making its way south and eventually to Fort DeSoto where it strolled in front of my camera for this photo. Good luck, little one!
