Welcome to Scott & Jill Houle, our
new stewards of Sandy Point for 2009
new stewards of Sandy Point for 2009
This is Cindy Maynard, the 2009 USFW summer intern.
The USFW is including Sandy Point in her territory for this
summer, so she will be on island 2 days a week (weekdays)
for a period of 3 to 4 hours each monitoring the nesting
plovers, oystercatchers, and least terns. She will also be
ready to do some educational outreach as it were while
monitoring if beachgoers are interested/curious in what she is
doing.
A very cooperative and generous local ALC volunteer has
offered to shuttle her out there in his small runabout style
boat. Our president was able to test this transport system with
USFW while at the same time meeting this very personable
young woman. It all went very smoothly and we thank USFW
for this support.
If you happen to meet Cindy out on island sometime this
summer, please welcome her and thank her for her work..
The USFW is including Sandy Point in her territory for this
summer, so she will be on island 2 days a week (weekdays)
for a period of 3 to 4 hours each monitoring the nesting
plovers, oystercatchers, and least terns. She will also be
ready to do some educational outreach as it were while
monitoring if beachgoers are interested/curious in what she is
doing.
A very cooperative and generous local ALC volunteer has
offered to shuttle her out there in his small runabout style
boat. Our president was able to test this transport system with
USFW while at the same time meeting this very personable
young woman. It all went very smoothly and we thank USFW
for this support.
If you happen to meet Cindy out on island sometime this
summer, please welcome her and thank her for her work..
| Some Sandy Pt photos are here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/rick_newton/sets/72157605419884144/ |
Sandy Point's Vulnerable Visitors
Sandy Point's Vulnerable Visitors
By Judy Benson
Published on 6/28/2009 in Home »Main Photo
Amid the gauze of heavy fog that hung over Sandy Point Friday morning, a downy, grape-sized head pushed
through a speckled eggshell, nestled in a shallow bowl in the sand beside its not-yet-hatched siblings.
Within hours, Cindy Maynard and Hannah Grist of the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service stood beside the humble nest to
welcome the tiny newborn piping plover with a few seconds of breathless wonder - just long enough to verify the
birth and count the remaining eggs without lingering long enough to scare off the plover parents.
VOLUNTEERS NEEDED
The Avalonia Land Conservancy is seeking volunteers to be plover stewards this summer. Those interested should
send an e-mail by clicking on “contact us” on the organization's Web site, www.avalonialandconservancy.org, or by
calling Anne Roberts-Pierson at 464-8101.
”Wow,” said Maynard, peering down at the baby plover, its eyes not yet open. A few yards away, one of the
newborn's parents dragged its wings along the sand to act the part of an injured bird, a decoy behavior plovers use
to trick would-be predators away from their nestlings.
”The day I found this nest it was doing the broken wing, so I knew I was really close,” said Maynard, a University of
Rhode Island wildlife biology student working for the Fish & Wildlife Service's Charlestown, R.I., office for the
summer. “So I just walked around in circles until I found it.”
As part of her duties with the Fish & Wildlife Service, Maynard has been spending two mornings a week at Sandy
Point keeping track of the nesting plovers, a sandy-colored shorebird that is federally endangered, and
oystercatchers, black and white birds striking for their slender orange bill and large golden eyes.
Two pairs of plovers have nested there this year, and four pairs of oystercatchers. One of the plover pairs are now
the parents of three chicks that could be seen Friday morning scurrying along the wrack lines and peeking out
toward the water from behind tufts of dune grass, while the other pair had its first chick born Friday and awaits two
more.
Three of the oystercatcher pairs also have chicks. The fourth lost its progeny Friday to a hungry herring gull, a
display of nature's harsh ways witnessed by Maynard and Grist, a graduate student in wildlife biology at URI from
the United Kingdom working as a summer intern for the Fish & Wildlife Service.
”That's so sad,” said Maynard, as she grabbed the wing tip of the juvenile oystercatcher carcass, floating in a few
inches of water just offshore.
Both oystercatchers and plovers are minimalist nesters, scratching shallow depressions in the sand just above the
high tide line to set their eggs, making them highly vulnerable to being accidentally trampled by humans or raided
by predators without special protection.
”That's why they're endangered,” said Grist.
MAKING A COMEBACK
Piping plovers populations are seeing a modest rebound.
Once depleted to just “a handful” of breeding pairs along the southern Rhode Island and southeastern Connecticut
coast, the petite birds, named for their high-pitched peep, are reaping the benefits of special protection and
restoration efforts begun after their listing as a federally endangered species in the mid-1980s.
”There's definitely been an increase,” Wendy Edwards, the piping plover coordinator at the U.S. Fish & Wildlife
Service office in Charlestown, R.I., said Friday. “We're seeing a bump up on all the beaches we're monitoring.”
Along the Atlantic coast, there are about 1,800 breeding pairs, including about 66 nesting pairs counted this
summer from Newport to Sandy Point, up from 63 last year, she said. Napatree Point in Westerly, she noted, has 10
nesting pairs this year, compared to six a year ago. The number of chicks that will be born and survive this year
won't be known until later this summer.
One of the main challenges in protecting the plovers, Edwards said, is the competing demands for beach use.
Plovers nest in some of the most popular places for beachgoers. Most people seem to be catching on about the
part they can play in helping the plovers to continue their comeback, Edwards said.
”We still do a lot of outreach on the beaches. It's gone from people saying, 'What's going on here?' (when they see
roped off areas and keep-out signs) to, 'How are the plovers doing?'”
”We want people to be able to use the beaches and enjoy the plovers,” Edwards said. “That's the balance we're
looking for.”
- Judy Benson
The barrier beach, just offshore from Stonington Borough, is a popular summer destination for kayakers and motor
boat owners, many of whom will spend several hours there with beach blankets and picnic baskets. A new
partnership between the Fish & Wildlife Service and the Avalonia Land Conservancy, the owner Sandy Point, brings
Maynard to the island twice a week to document and protect the rare shorebirds.
Grist came to Sandy Point Friday for another Fish & Wildlife project focusing on terns, and was pleased to discover
a mixed flock of about 30 common terns and 20 roseate terns, a critically endangered bird, and will be checking
back to learn if they nest there.
”There's a juvenile in there,” said Grist, surveying the tern flock through binoculars. “It looks like it's being fed.”
Some areas roped off
Anne Roberts-Pierson, president of the land conservancy, said visitors to Sandy Point will notice changes this
summer. Areas where the plover nests are located have been roped off until the young fledge in a month, and the
nest with the eggs is surrounded by a wire cage.
The conservancy is also recruiting volunteers to position themselves at spots along the beach that need to remain
open so the adult birds and their young can get to the water to feed on horseshoe crab eggs and other marine
creatures.
Roberts-Pierson said there will still be plenty of spots for people to set blankets and walk. On the weekends, the
island will also be patrolled by conservancy staff, and both the volunteers and the staff will try to educate visitors
about the birds and the reasons for the protection efforts.
”We've not done anything like this there ever,” she said. “We're hoping the people who use Sandy Point will be
stakeholders with us in helping the birds. We have a rich habitat there, and we'd like to have a nice balance.”
Ferrying Maynard to Sandy Point for her twice-weekly visits is Paul Janssens, a volunteer and member of the land
conservancy who keeps his Boston Whaler at a dock in front of his waterfront house in the borough. In addition to
keeping track of the shorebird activity, Maynard is also keeping tabs on how humans use and misuse Sandy Point.
On Friday, for example, she noted paw prints of at least two large dogs in the sand behind the roped off areas,
evidence that people were disobeying the no-dogs rule for the island, and a dozen empty bottles of LandShark
lager left in a pile.
”I've been taking pictures of the fire remains, too,” she said.
Ultimately, the information she gathers on the shorebirds and the human use will be the basis of a Fish & Wildlife
Service report to the conservancy.
”We're going to give them recommendations on how they should manage their land if they want to have a good
shorebird population,” she said.
"Regional"
Total 5 images.
Buy Photo
By Sean D. Elliot
One of a mated pair of piping plover, left, chases a blackback gull from near its nest Friday on Sandy Point off
Stonington. Inset: A newly hatched piping plover chick nestles down with three eggs remaining in the nest.
Buy Photo
By Sean D. Elliot
U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service technician Cindy Maynard, left, and intern Hannah Grist survey the population of piping
plover, oystercatcher and common and roseate terns Friday on Sandy Point.
Buy Photo
By Sean D. Elliot
An adult oystercatcher files over the water Friday, just off the beach at Stonington Point.
Buy Photo
By Sean D. Elliot
A newly hatched Piping Plover chick nestles down with three more eggs in a nest on Sandy Point as U.S. Fish and
Wildlife Service Biological Science Technician Cindy Maynard and USFWS intern Hannah Grist survey the
population of Piping Plover, Oystercatcher and Common and Roseate Terns Friday, June 26, 2009 off Stonington.
Buy Photo
By Sean D. Elliot
A flying piping plover.
Sandy Point's Vulnerable Visitors
By Judy Benson
Published on 6/28/2009 in Home »Main Photo
Amid the gauze of heavy fog that hung over Sandy Point Friday morning, a downy, grape-sized head pushed
through a speckled eggshell, nestled in a shallow bowl in the sand beside its not-yet-hatched siblings.
Within hours, Cindy Maynard and Hannah Grist of the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service stood beside the humble nest to
welcome the tiny newborn piping plover with a few seconds of breathless wonder - just long enough to verify the
birth and count the remaining eggs without lingering long enough to scare off the plover parents.
VOLUNTEERS NEEDED
The Avalonia Land Conservancy is seeking volunteers to be plover stewards this summer. Those interested should
send an e-mail by clicking on “contact us” on the organization's Web site, www.avalonialandconservancy.org, or by
calling Anne Roberts-Pierson at 464-8101.
”Wow,” said Maynard, peering down at the baby plover, its eyes not yet open. A few yards away, one of the
newborn's parents dragged its wings along the sand to act the part of an injured bird, a decoy behavior plovers use
to trick would-be predators away from their nestlings.
”The day I found this nest it was doing the broken wing, so I knew I was really close,” said Maynard, a University of
Rhode Island wildlife biology student working for the Fish & Wildlife Service's Charlestown, R.I., office for the
summer. “So I just walked around in circles until I found it.”
As part of her duties with the Fish & Wildlife Service, Maynard has been spending two mornings a week at Sandy
Point keeping track of the nesting plovers, a sandy-colored shorebird that is federally endangered, and
oystercatchers, black and white birds striking for their slender orange bill and large golden eyes.
Two pairs of plovers have nested there this year, and four pairs of oystercatchers. One of the plover pairs are now
the parents of three chicks that could be seen Friday morning scurrying along the wrack lines and peeking out
toward the water from behind tufts of dune grass, while the other pair had its first chick born Friday and awaits two
more.
Three of the oystercatcher pairs also have chicks. The fourth lost its progeny Friday to a hungry herring gull, a
display of nature's harsh ways witnessed by Maynard and Grist, a graduate student in wildlife biology at URI from
the United Kingdom working as a summer intern for the Fish & Wildlife Service.
”That's so sad,” said Maynard, as she grabbed the wing tip of the juvenile oystercatcher carcass, floating in a few
inches of water just offshore.
Both oystercatchers and plovers are minimalist nesters, scratching shallow depressions in the sand just above the
high tide line to set their eggs, making them highly vulnerable to being accidentally trampled by humans or raided
by predators without special protection.
”That's why they're endangered,” said Grist.
MAKING A COMEBACK
Piping plovers populations are seeing a modest rebound.
Once depleted to just “a handful” of breeding pairs along the southern Rhode Island and southeastern Connecticut
coast, the petite birds, named for their high-pitched peep, are reaping the benefits of special protection and
restoration efforts begun after their listing as a federally endangered species in the mid-1980s.
”There's definitely been an increase,” Wendy Edwards, the piping plover coordinator at the U.S. Fish & Wildlife
Service office in Charlestown, R.I., said Friday. “We're seeing a bump up on all the beaches we're monitoring.”
Along the Atlantic coast, there are about 1,800 breeding pairs, including about 66 nesting pairs counted this
summer from Newport to Sandy Point, up from 63 last year, she said. Napatree Point in Westerly, she noted, has 10
nesting pairs this year, compared to six a year ago. The number of chicks that will be born and survive this year
won't be known until later this summer.
One of the main challenges in protecting the plovers, Edwards said, is the competing demands for beach use.
Plovers nest in some of the most popular places for beachgoers. Most people seem to be catching on about the
part they can play in helping the plovers to continue their comeback, Edwards said.
”We still do a lot of outreach on the beaches. It's gone from people saying, 'What's going on here?' (when they see
roped off areas and keep-out signs) to, 'How are the plovers doing?'”
”We want people to be able to use the beaches and enjoy the plovers,” Edwards said. “That's the balance we're
looking for.”
- Judy Benson
The barrier beach, just offshore from Stonington Borough, is a popular summer destination for kayakers and motor
boat owners, many of whom will spend several hours there with beach blankets and picnic baskets. A new
partnership between the Fish & Wildlife Service and the Avalonia Land Conservancy, the owner Sandy Point, brings
Maynard to the island twice a week to document and protect the rare shorebirds.
Grist came to Sandy Point Friday for another Fish & Wildlife project focusing on terns, and was pleased to discover
a mixed flock of about 30 common terns and 20 roseate terns, a critically endangered bird, and will be checking
back to learn if they nest there.
”There's a juvenile in there,” said Grist, surveying the tern flock through binoculars. “It looks like it's being fed.”
Some areas roped off
Anne Roberts-Pierson, president of the land conservancy, said visitors to Sandy Point will notice changes this
summer. Areas where the plover nests are located have been roped off until the young fledge in a month, and the
nest with the eggs is surrounded by a wire cage.
The conservancy is also recruiting volunteers to position themselves at spots along the beach that need to remain
open so the adult birds and their young can get to the water to feed on horseshoe crab eggs and other marine
creatures.
Roberts-Pierson said there will still be plenty of spots for people to set blankets and walk. On the weekends, the
island will also be patrolled by conservancy staff, and both the volunteers and the staff will try to educate visitors
about the birds and the reasons for the protection efforts.
”We've not done anything like this there ever,” she said. “We're hoping the people who use Sandy Point will be
stakeholders with us in helping the birds. We have a rich habitat there, and we'd like to have a nice balance.”
Ferrying Maynard to Sandy Point for her twice-weekly visits is Paul Janssens, a volunteer and member of the land
conservancy who keeps his Boston Whaler at a dock in front of his waterfront house in the borough. In addition to
keeping track of the shorebird activity, Maynard is also keeping tabs on how humans use and misuse Sandy Point.
On Friday, for example, she noted paw prints of at least two large dogs in the sand behind the roped off areas,
evidence that people were disobeying the no-dogs rule for the island, and a dozen empty bottles of LandShark
lager left in a pile.
”I've been taking pictures of the fire remains, too,” she said.
Ultimately, the information she gathers on the shorebirds and the human use will be the basis of a Fish & Wildlife
Service report to the conservancy.
”We're going to give them recommendations on how they should manage their land if they want to have a good
shorebird population,” she said.
"Regional"
Total 5 images.
Buy Photo
By Sean D. Elliot
One of a mated pair of piping plover, left, chases a blackback gull from near its nest Friday on Sandy Point off
Stonington. Inset: A newly hatched piping plover chick nestles down with three eggs remaining in the nest.
Buy Photo
By Sean D. Elliot
U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service technician Cindy Maynard, left, and intern Hannah Grist survey the population of piping
plover, oystercatcher and common and roseate terns Friday on Sandy Point.
Buy Photo
By Sean D. Elliot
An adult oystercatcher files over the water Friday, just off the beach at Stonington Point.
Buy Photo
By Sean D. Elliot
A newly hatched Piping Plover chick nestles down with three more eggs in a nest on Sandy Point as U.S. Fish and
Wildlife Service Biological Science Technician Cindy Maynard and USFWS intern Hannah Grist survey the
population of Piping Plover, Oystercatcher and Common and Roseate Terns Friday, June 26, 2009 off Stonington.
Buy Photo
By Sean D. Elliot
A flying piping plover.
The following article appeared in "The Day". A better copy with photos can be seen on their web site
Joellen Anderson's pictures and commentary. Link here for
aerial photo and here for pictures of Fish and Wildlife project
aerial photo and here for pictures of Fish and Wildlife project