Thanks,
Good to know.
Wayne
On 9/7/2018 8:26:46 AM, DJ Lauten and KACastelein <deweysage@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
Hi Wayne
The plovers aren't too discerning about substrate. At Floras Lake and New River
south the beach is very gravelly, and they will happily nest in it. As Russ
mentioned, plovers have nested on gravel bars in the Eel River in Humboldt Cty.
This is a unique habitat with very large gravel, compared to Floras Lake/New
River. What tends to be more important to them is the open habitat. They will
gladly nest on salt flats, sandy beaches, gravel bars, and in shell hash. It is
far more important to be open and have a good line of sight.
Cheers
Dave Lauten
On 9/6/2018 8:36 AM, Wayne Hoffman wrote:
Hi, Dave -
The Gold Beach nesting is particularly interesting, as the sand on the beaches
I am familiar with there is much coarser than anywhere I know of as plover
habitat. Do they nest on such coarse sand on the California coast?
Wayne
On 9/6/2018 8:22:57 AM, DJ Lauten and KACastelein <deweysage@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
[mailto:deweysage@xxxxxxxxxxxx] wrote:
Hi folks,
Dave mentioned how far and fast these plovers disperse. Well, a couple of
points - Snowies will and do disperse in both north and south directions. Some
birds winter further north than the breed. But to put the dispersal into
perspective, I have reports of juvenile plovers from this year currently in
Guadalupe -Nipomo NWR (this would be central California coast) and Camp
Pendelton and Coronado Naval Base both in the San Diego area. No small jump!
Also we had a record number of plovers attempting or successfully nesting at a
number of locations in Oregon outside of the core nesting area (which is
Florence to Floras Lake). These include:
* Clatsop Spit/Ft. Stevens 1 nest
* Nehalem
* Bayocean Spit - 1 nest
* Sitka Sedge - 1 nest
* Newport Area:
* Agate Beach - brood reported
* South Beach SP - at least 3 nests one that fledged 2 chicks
* Waldport area: multiple nests
* Quail St to Alsea mouth (incl Driftwood Shore SP)
* South Alsea to Patterson SP
* Elk River - 1 nest successfully fledged
* Gold Beach 1 nest; this location is extremely interesting as it was not an
expected location and it is to our knowledge was not a known plover nesting
beach historically and a very rare Curry cty nest outside of Floras Lake.
There may be more than this, but at a minimum this is what I know at the moment.
Please do report any band combos you may see, and best yet try to get some
pictures as it can be tricky to accurately report color bands and combinations.
Thanks Dave, and everyone else who cares and has interest. These are Oregon
birds, and we are one of the few populations that has been very successful at
recovery efforts, and we should all be proud of our Oregon Plovers. They are
very special birds, and really a joy to work with.
Big Kudos goes out to all the agencies and people involved in the recovery
effort including our current team Daniel Farrar, Adam Kotaich, Erica Krygsman,
and Eleanor Gaines (Oregon Biodiversity Information Center): Laura Todd at
USFWS and all the folks at FWS; Vanessa Blackstone at OPRD who has worked
tirelessly along the north coast to get the plovers back breeding there - and
all the other folks at OPRD who deal with myriad and often difficult recreation
issues; Cindy Burns at USFS Dunes Rec Area and all the staff that works with
her - the Dunes Rec area is really the CORE of the plover breeding range in
Oregon; all the great folks at BLM Coos Bay (too many to name!!) whose support
thru the years has been unwavering; Army Corp of Engineers who partly own the
most important nesting site north of Monterrey Bay (Coos Bay North Spit) and
also are instrumental at Clatsop Spit; ODFW (Charlie Bruce retired and Martin
Nugent and Stu Love to name a few); and importantly Wildlife Services - all the
guys who have worked for Paul Wolf and Mike Burrell - without these guys and
the difficult work they do, there would not be this many plovers.
cheers
Dave Lauten and Kathy Castelein
On 9/5/2018 11:05 PM, David Irons wrote:
Greetings All,
This past weekend Shawneen and I found three Snowy Plovers on the open beach on
Nehalem Spit. We walked the entire spit from the parking lot at the end of the
road through Nehalem Bay State Park all the way to the north jetty of Nehalem
Bay. The plovers were about half way down the beach maybe a mile to a mile and
a quarter south from the trail between the parking area and the beach.
Over recent months I have sent photographs of banded Snowy Plovers–first from
Clatsop County and now from Tillamook County–to Dave Lauten who keeps track of
all the band combinations used on birds hatched along the Oregon coast.
Although potential Snowy Plover nesting areas have been signed off and closed
in Tillamook and Clatsop Counties, all of the banded birds that I've
photographed thus far in northern coastal counties have originated from nesting
sites in Coos and Douglas Counties, where Dave, Kathy Castelein, Daniel Farrar
and others have been monitoring and helping manage and protect Oregon's fragile
coastal breeding population for about twenty years or so.
Interestingly, all three birds that we found on Nehalem Spit this past Sunday
were juveniles that fledged this summer. Two wore color bands revealing that
they came from Douglas and Coos County nesting sites. The third had no band, so
where it hatched is unknown. It's interesting that birds hatched in either Coos
or Douglas County would so quickly disperse north more than 150 miles. I heard
through the grapevine that there was an active nest along the river beach north
of the south jetty of the Columbia this summer, but I don't know if any young
fledged.
I would encourage anyone who encounters banded Snowy Plovers on northern Oregon
beaches to get photos and send them to Dave Lauten (deweysage@xxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:deweysage@xxxxxxxxxxxx]). Dave always responds promptly, usually with
the nesting location and date when each bird was banded. It is wonderful–and a
testament to the hard work of many people (particularly those mentioned
above)–that we have these birds regularly occurring in Oregon's northern
coastal counties again. Over the past three decades or so Snowy Plovers have
been mostly absent or at least very difficult to find in Clatsop, Tillamook,
and Lincoln Counties.
The attached photo was taken on Nehalem Spit on 2 September 2018.
Dave Irons
Beaverton, OR
