Thanks for my continuing education... I hold my breath for that little bird, and all the others who's habitat is in the way of the 'American way of life' and that entitlement that is part and parcel, only to be amped unashamedly in these next 4 years!
Holding my breath too ... the thing that gives me hope is that although they haven't recovered much in the past 20 years under our lax care, at least they haven't gone downhill. That shows me they are a resilient bunch of little ones. I think with some good management of human impacts, they might really bounce back quickly!
I have been called a misanthropist and in some respects am. I admit to valuing that little bird over the entire incoming administration. But as you say, people are people and children will play, dogs go off-leash and signs ignored. There are simply too many of us, good actors and bad actors alike. Even if there were ten St Francises walking in the beach they would still inadvertantly crush the little speckled eggs. Habitat destruction, the extinction of species, the obliviousness of power and privilege. Too many of us.
Put an eight-foot high chain link fence around the protected acreage. That would protect the eggs from children and dogs and would be much harder to pull down.
Yes - I know you've been reading Jason Anthony for a long time. I thought his piece on the issue of scale with tires a couple of weeks back really highlighted your point. Of course, he did a good series on human population last year too...
The nature of the noosphere. Similar or identical ideas occurring to different people. Take Leibnitz, Newton, and the differential calculus. Social media has only magnified the phenomena- we're like a tribe passing ideas, like curious objects, around a campfire. A glorified form of gossip, I suppose. Those of us who are intensely worried about the global heating (I prefer that term to "warming" which is much too mild a word for what is going on) did the math, some of us decades ago. Heating was anthropogenic and with that as a starting premise then the question became what were the things we were doing that were causative drivers. We looked at the graphs of temperature rise and saw a uniform linkage to the rise of the industrial age and the increasing use of fossil fuels. The rest was the working out of the details of multiple domino effects. For me, it's been a long learning experience that started when I read Rachel Carson when I was a pre-teen, went into hiatus, picked up again the first Earth Day, went into hiatus again, then picked up again in the Reagan era and has continued and accelerated ever since. My library is now full of climate related books and I gravitate to science blogs and climate related Substacks as well as the climate community on Bluesky. For myself, I am convinced that the ur-problem is our population and our consumption behaviors. We want ever-increasingly luxurious lifestyles and there are those economic forces only too eager to both stimulate and feed those demands. We take up too much habitat, we crowd other species out with our cancerous urbanization and agriculture, we cut down the forests, destroy the sea floors, fill the world with industrial toxins, the seas and souls and ourselves with nano-plastics and as Jason has pointed out nano-rubber byproducts. Our roads, our jets, our cars, our herds- we are a one-species wrecking ball. We just must reduce our numbers. Drastically.
Frankly Rebecca, I think the planet might be better off without us.
I am struggling to reply, but appreciate your work and your piece evokes many bird watching memories, including Plovers and others on the Atlantic shore in Anastasia Island State Park outside my beloved St. Augustine, FLA. I do need to add a few stats on dogs: 60M are "owned" here in the US, but 10% are abandoned annually, so 6,000,000 abandoned dogs annually. Here in Marietta, Ohio, we have many dogs (on leaches) and their owners walk them down the sidewalks dutifully. Walkers without dogs are rare indeed. In my 4 yrs. here so far, I have seen the biome decline: one Monarch this year, but many 4yrs. ago, the crows are very rare now, and only the Starlings are holding their own and please the eye with their group flights. Most importantly for the butterflies and bees is the lack of flowers, which the general population seems oblivious to, and one woman even cut down the only Milkweeds in her small garden. It appears that our loss of respect for the natural world is near its conclusion. Have a blessed day and enjoy your walks on the CA beach. You are blessed.
I struggled to write about this, too. I am at the end of my patience, yet also so aware of my own failings as a human here on earth. This problem with the plovers is especially frustrating, though, for me, because the answer is actually pretty straightforward (seems that way to me anyway). But, it gives me heart that they are still with us and haven't declined through our mismanagement of the past 20 years or more ... if we could do better by them, they seem pretty resilient and might bounce back really quickly. Dogs ... sigh. We don't do very well by our canine companions, either. That abandonment number you cited is heartbreaking.
Can people come together to start teaching school aged kids about the area? Actually going into classrooms and talking about them. Start with our young.
That is where so much good lies, I think: with kids. They are so creative and energetic, and are always focused on how to do something, rather than reasons it won't work.
Susan, that is so kind of you to say. I'm honored that you felt something from my words and were motivated to write this note and offer your support. You made my day. Really. Wishing you a beautiful holiday season.
🥺 Oh my goodness. Thank you Katharine. What was the zoom topic? (I just bought Amy Tan's new book with all the bird drawings. It's on my list for next year!)
I've seen snowy plover breeding area signage on a sandbar at the mouth of the San Luis Del Rey River in Oceanside, just south of Camp Pendleton. I'll take a closer look when we're down there in March /April. Here in Napier NZ, areas of beach are roped off for breeding dotterels, a species of plover. https://www.nzbirdsonline.org.nz/species/new-zealand-dotterel
What a beautiful bird! I am so grateful to you for introducing me to this little plover species. I'd never heard of a dotterel! I'll be curious to hear what you discover in Oceanside, when you're back in the U.S. -- especially if they've done a better job up there protecting the nesting sites than down in CA.
We face similar challenges here in Massachusetts trying to protect our nesting Piping Plovers. Here is what our local refuge says works:
"Regarding the piping plover, our threatened species in Mass., Parker River closes the beaches from April to whenever the last chick has fledged. Lot 1 and the beach accessed from its boardwalk remain open as does the beach at Sandy Point (a state property). Plover wardens are stationed at each beach to educate the public about plovers' need for special protection. Law enforcement will get after people found walking on the beaches between Lot 1 and Sandy Point though there is only one officer for the entire refuge. Dogs are not allowed beyond the Refuge gate. This strategy results in about 40 - 50 chicks being successfully raised each summer. As far as I know the staff, who monitor the nests and collect the data, are pleased with this arrangement and the results.
The Refuge manager says he expects wildlife protection programs like plover management to continue during the next four years but that the messaging about refuges will shift to recreational uses such as hunting and fishing - allowed at Parker River with restrictions."
Maybe some ideas could be implemented in California.
That's great! I might email that paragraph to the state parks dept that manages the plover breeding beach I was writing about, if that's okay? Was it from their website (so I can send the state parks folks to the right place)?
I regularly visit a remote beach accessible only by kayak, much of which is roped off for plover nesting, and which I avoid. Except when I had to answer the call of nature. Of course that's when a wildlife officer appeared. Mea culpa.
A great factual piece, Rebecca. I happen to adore Plovers - we have about 8 resident off migratory Plover species here in Australia - and similar conservation issues. Protection measures are put in place, but without the funding to follow through on them. We have marvellous National Parks, but insufficient funding for effective land management.
Another great letter
🙏🙏🙏
Thanks for my continuing education... I hold my breath for that little bird, and all the others who's habitat is in the way of the 'American way of life' and that entitlement that is part and parcel, only to be amped unashamedly in these next 4 years!
Holding my breath too ... the thing that gives me hope is that although they haven't recovered much in the past 20 years under our lax care, at least they haven't gone downhill. That shows me they are a resilient bunch of little ones. I think with some good management of human impacts, they might really bounce back quickly!
I have been called a misanthropist and in some respects am. I admit to valuing that little bird over the entire incoming administration. But as you say, people are people and children will play, dogs go off-leash and signs ignored. There are simply too many of us, good actors and bad actors alike. Even if there were ten St Francises walking in the beach they would still inadvertantly crush the little speckled eggs. Habitat destruction, the extinction of species, the obliviousness of power and privilege. Too many of us.
Put an eight-foot high chain link fence around the protected acreage. That would protect the eggs from children and dogs and would be much harder to pull down.
Yes - I know you've been reading Jason Anthony for a long time. I thought his piece on the issue of scale with tires a couple of weeks back really highlighted your point. Of course, he did a good series on human population last year too...
The nature of the noosphere. Similar or identical ideas occurring to different people. Take Leibnitz, Newton, and the differential calculus. Social media has only magnified the phenomena- we're like a tribe passing ideas, like curious objects, around a campfire. A glorified form of gossip, I suppose. Those of us who are intensely worried about the global heating (I prefer that term to "warming" which is much too mild a word for what is going on) did the math, some of us decades ago. Heating was anthropogenic and with that as a starting premise then the question became what were the things we were doing that were causative drivers. We looked at the graphs of temperature rise and saw a uniform linkage to the rise of the industrial age and the increasing use of fossil fuels. The rest was the working out of the details of multiple domino effects. For me, it's been a long learning experience that started when I read Rachel Carson when I was a pre-teen, went into hiatus, picked up again the first Earth Day, went into hiatus again, then picked up again in the Reagan era and has continued and accelerated ever since. My library is now full of climate related books and I gravitate to science blogs and climate related Substacks as well as the climate community on Bluesky. For myself, I am convinced that the ur-problem is our population and our consumption behaviors. We want ever-increasingly luxurious lifestyles and there are those economic forces only too eager to both stimulate and feed those demands. We take up too much habitat, we crowd other species out with our cancerous urbanization and agriculture, we cut down the forests, destroy the sea floors, fill the world with industrial toxins, the seas and souls and ourselves with nano-plastics and as Jason has pointed out nano-rubber byproducts. Our roads, our jets, our cars, our herds- we are a one-species wrecking ball. We just must reduce our numbers. Drastically.
Frankly Rebecca, I think the planet might be better off without us.
Sigh…. Thanks again.
Restacked in Substack and posted to Bluesky
I am struggling to reply, but appreciate your work and your piece evokes many bird watching memories, including Plovers and others on the Atlantic shore in Anastasia Island State Park outside my beloved St. Augustine, FLA. I do need to add a few stats on dogs: 60M are "owned" here in the US, but 10% are abandoned annually, so 6,000,000 abandoned dogs annually. Here in Marietta, Ohio, we have many dogs (on leaches) and their owners walk them down the sidewalks dutifully. Walkers without dogs are rare indeed. In my 4 yrs. here so far, I have seen the biome decline: one Monarch this year, but many 4yrs. ago, the crows are very rare now, and only the Starlings are holding their own and please the eye with their group flights. Most importantly for the butterflies and bees is the lack of flowers, which the general population seems oblivious to, and one woman even cut down the only Milkweeds in her small garden. It appears that our loss of respect for the natural world is near its conclusion. Have a blessed day and enjoy your walks on the CA beach. You are blessed.
Great post Gregg. Much happiness to you.
I struggled to write about this, too. I am at the end of my patience, yet also so aware of my own failings as a human here on earth. This problem with the plovers is especially frustrating, though, for me, because the answer is actually pretty straightforward (seems that way to me anyway). But, it gives me heart that they are still with us and haven't declined through our mismanagement of the past 20 years or more ... if we could do better by them, they seem pretty resilient and might bounce back really quickly. Dogs ... sigh. We don't do very well by our canine companions, either. That abandonment number you cited is heartbreaking.
We could definitely close that beach for a few months a year!
Can people come together to start teaching school aged kids about the area? Actually going into classrooms and talking about them. Start with our young.
That is where so much good lies, I think: with kids. They are so creative and energetic, and are always focused on how to do something, rather than reasons it won't work.
Thank you for making us *feel* what you saw on that beach, and what you share from your experience. You're gifted.
Susan, that is so kind of you to say. I'm honored that you felt something from my words and were motivated to write this note and offer your support. You made my day. Really. Wishing you a beautiful holiday season.
I was on a zoom with J. Drew Lanham and Amy Tan last night. They would be proud of you. I know the plovers are.💛💫
🥺 Oh my goodness. Thank you Katharine. What was the zoom topic? (I just bought Amy Tan's new book with all the bird drawings. It's on my list for next year!)
Birds as teachers 💫
You will love her book💛
I've seen snowy plover breeding area signage on a sandbar at the mouth of the San Luis Del Rey River in Oceanside, just south of Camp Pendleton. I'll take a closer look when we're down there in March /April. Here in Napier NZ, areas of beach are roped off for breeding dotterels, a species of plover. https://www.nzbirdsonline.org.nz/species/new-zealand-dotterel
Thanks for writing!
What a beautiful bird! I am so grateful to you for introducing me to this little plover species. I'd never heard of a dotterel! I'll be curious to hear what you discover in Oceanside, when you're back in the U.S. -- especially if they've done a better job up there protecting the nesting sites than down in CA.
We face similar challenges here in Massachusetts trying to protect our nesting Piping Plovers. Here is what our local refuge says works:
"Regarding the piping plover, our threatened species in Mass., Parker River closes the beaches from April to whenever the last chick has fledged. Lot 1 and the beach accessed from its boardwalk remain open as does the beach at Sandy Point (a state property). Plover wardens are stationed at each beach to educate the public about plovers' need for special protection. Law enforcement will get after people found walking on the beaches between Lot 1 and Sandy Point though there is only one officer for the entire refuge. Dogs are not allowed beyond the Refuge gate. This strategy results in about 40 - 50 chicks being successfully raised each summer. As far as I know the staff, who monitor the nests and collect the data, are pleased with this arrangement and the results.
The Refuge manager says he expects wildlife protection programs like plover management to continue during the next four years but that the messaging about refuges will shift to recreational uses such as hunting and fishing - allowed at Parker River with restrictions."
Maybe some ideas could be implemented in California.
That's great! I might email that paragraph to the state parks dept that manages the plover breeding beach I was writing about, if that's okay? Was it from their website (so I can send the state parks folks to the right place)?
I regularly visit a remote beach accessible only by kayak, much of which is roped off for plover nesting, and which I avoid. Except when I had to answer the call of nature. Of course that's when a wildlife officer appeared. Mea culpa.
A great factual piece, Rebecca. I happen to adore Plovers - we have about 8 resident off migratory Plover species here in Australia - and similar conservation issues. Protection measures are put in place, but without the funding to follow through on them. We have marvellous National Parks, but insufficient funding for effective land management.
At least we don't have Trump.
Yet.
Best Wishes - Dave