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And then there were nine

Dedicated guardians care for piping plovers

By: Arielle Godbout

Posted: 07/29/2009 1:00 AM | Comments: 0 (including replies)

Piping plovers in their natural habitat at Grand Beach. Volunteers will use the ID bands on their legs to keep track of them during next spring's migration. (TREVOR.HAGAN@FREEPRESS.MB.CA )

GRAND BEACH -- Each summer, Matt Tebbutt drives nine hours from his home in Minnesota to Manitoba, where he spends all of June and July at his cabin in Grand Marais.

Tebbutt, whose father was originally from Winnipeg, said he'd limit his visit to a couple weeks if it weren't for the piping plovers -- small, white birds that could fit in the palm of his hand.

Tebbutt is one of about 60 volunteer guardians who watch over the endangered birds as they nest in the white sand of Grand Beach and this year -- for the first time ever -- at Gimli Beach.

"How often do you get to see an endangered species in its natural habitat?" Tebbutt asked fondly, looking over to where one of this year's chicks scurried across the beach.

Alex Froese, co-ordinator of the Manitoba Piping Plover Recovery Program, said her staff counted nine adult birds in the province this year, while hobby bird-watchers reported a possible four other sightings.

And that's all. Nine piping plovers -- a sharp drop from the 80 adult birds counted in 1991.

The plover problem began in the early 1900s, said Froese, when the birds were hunted for their feathers and eggs. The birds' recovery from near extinction has been threatened by the loss of their natural habitat and human interference, she explained.

That's why Manitoba Conservation began the recovery program in 2002. A small number of staff, aided by a handful of loyal volunteers, monitors the plovers from early morning to late at night during the nesting period in June, and for the 20 to 25 days after the chicks hatch, when they're most vulnerable.

Tebbutt has been a plover guardian for three years, and spent about 20 to 30 hours each week watching over the two nests, and later the chicks, at Grand Beach this year.

He admitted it's easy to become attached to the birds, and recounted a day in early July when he discovered two chicks had disappeared during the night. Tebbutt said he was devastated, especially since he had worked the late shift that night, which ended at 9:30 p.m.

"You second-guess yourself, and think 'If I had been there, would things have been OK?'" he said. Sometimes, he even dreams about the plovers at night -- a phenomenon Froese admitted to as well.

While Tebbutt will volunteer for eight hours a day at the beach, he said the only tough part is the end of July, when the chicks begin preparing for their migration to the Gulf of Mexico.

"It's very depressing now when they're big kids and they can be on their own," he said. "To me, it's the end of the summer when the birds fly away and I have to go home."

While Froese said the recovery program has been successful in keeping the chicks safe from predators and beach goers, there have not been substantially higher numbers of piping plovers arriving each year to nest in Manitoba.

She said the birds hatched in Manitoba might not be surviving the migration, or could be nesting in Alberta, Saskatchewan or the U.S.

This year, the six surviving chicks at Grand Beach and the three at Gimli have been fitted with ID bands, so they can be identified wherever they show up next. "Hopefully next year we'll have a bird show up with a Manitoba band, and that would be fantastic," Tebbutt said.

arielle.godbout@freepress.mb.ca

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition July 29, 2009 A6

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