Piping plovers return ahead of schedule
BY PETER B. BRACE INDEPENDENT WRITER
On Great Point, the annual return of piping plovers is about two weeks earlier than normal this year, boding well for fishermen and others who drive out to the northern-most extremity of the island for fishing and sunning.

Piping plover ROB BENCHLEY/The Independent

Early nesting potentially means parents can teach their young to fly - an instruction known as fledging - earlier, which translates into beaches closing and opening sooner in the season.

"Things are happening earlier than they did last year, maybe by a couple of weeks," said Trustees of Reservations Property Superintendent Steve Nicolle. "It's specific to Great Point. Normally, things happen at different times on the rest of the island than they do on Great Point."

Piping plovers need around 25 to 30 days to fledge their chicks. Nicolle closes his beaches as soon plover eggs hatch.

Nicolle said he could not explain the premature arrival of these nesting shorebirds classified as a state and federally threatened species; nonetheless, he is keeping a watchful eye on the three pairs he is aware of as they prepare to begin building their nests as well as a large herd of seals on the tip of Great Point, which he is protecting with fencing and signs warning people away.

"As usual, on the southern Galls [we have] two pairs and we have one pair over by the Brock cottage at the very start of Coatue," said Nicolle on April 25. "No nests yet, but we're hopeful for something soon."

The sooner the adult plovers nest, produce eggs and fledge their young, the quicker Nicolle can reopen the sand roads under his care should he need to close them to protect the plovers, which walk down to the water's edge to feed rather than fly out over the water and dive into it.

Likely on the same early schedule as the Great Point piping plovers are those under the care of the Massachusetts Audubon Society. Ellen Jedrey, Assistant Director of the Coastal Waterbird program for Mass Audubon, reports that she is monitoring the nests of five plover pairs between Wauwinet and Sesachacha Pond, two pairs of which already have one egg each in their nests. One nest is on the barrier beach in front of Sesachacha Pond, one near Squam Pond and the other three between Squam Pond and Wauwinet.

Farther up the island's eastern shore from Wauwinet, ecologist Karen Beattie of the Nantucket Conservation Foundation has her eyes on one pair of plovers on the ocean side of the Haulover. Then west of there at the town end of Coatue, she is watching two pairs at Coatue Point and one at First Point, along with multiple pairs of American oystercatchers.

Like the rest of the plovers under her care, those on Eel Point are still being counted.

"They're just starting to establish nests, so we don't have an accurate count of them," said Beattie. "Edie [Ray] has seen as many as five pairs at the Bathtubs and oystercatchers as well."

Beattie is also aware of a pair of plovers on the east side of the cut between Hummock Pond and the ocean.

The plovers seeking the best seats in the sand for the Nantucket Cottage Hospital's annual Boston Pops concert are also back this year, said Town Beach Manager Jeff Carlson.

"We've had two to three pairs down at Jetties Beach in the same place where they were before and I've [got] one pair down at Low Beach in 'Sconset," he said.

Carlson and the aforementioned beach property managers are planting fences around the areas where plovers are nesting on their properties and marking them with signs warning people of the birds' presence, urging caution and in some cases, prohibiting entry.

On Great Point, Nicolle said that in addition to areas restricted to humans, all of this refuge is closed

to dogs from April 1 Sept. 15. I