Conserve Wildlife Blog

Posts Tagged ‘Cape Cod’

BAHAMAS PIPING PLOVER PROJECT

Sunday, February 9th, 2014
WINTERING PIPING PLOVER SURVEYS ON ABACO

By Todd Pover, Beach Nesting Bird Project Manager and Stephanie Egger, Wildlife Biologist

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The Bahamas piping plover survey tally board in the “central command” room at Schooner Bay Institute.

An integral part of this Bahamas trip entailed surveying several sites not previous covered on Abaco and revisiting some sites not checked since the 2011 International Piping Plover Census. Although we didn’t find large concentrations of piping plovers at any one new site, we did make some noteworthy discoveries.

One of the most exciting find was the resight of a piping plover that was banded on the breeding grounds last summer in Massachusetts as part of a flight behavior study. New Jersey also participated in this research and we briefly thought it might be one of the birds banded in our home state – but it turned out that it was banded (and nested) on Chapin Beach, Cape Cod and is wintering at Schooner Bay, Abaco (amongst 15 other piping plovers found on our survey). (more…)

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Posted in Bahamas Piping Plover Project, Beach Nesting Birds, Shorebirds, Wildlife Protection | 1 Comment »

Overview of piping plover flight behavior research

Thursday, September 19th, 2013
CWF alumni guest blog

By Emily Heiser, Piping Plover Research Technician

Emily Heiser (l) and Lauren Gingerella (r) with piping plovers in hand for banding.

Emily Heiser (l) and Lauren Gingerella (r) with piping plovers in hand for banding.

Call me crazy, but the combination of piping plovers and New Jersey are just too much for me to resist! Over the last six years, I have spent the majority of my time working for Conserve Wildlife Foundation of New Jersey and New Jersey Division of Fish and Wildlife protecting piping plovers on their nesting grounds. Most recently I worked on a research project with the State University of New York-ESF that dealt with piping plover flight behavior in Stone Harbor, Avalon and Strathmere, New Jersey. The project’s graduate student, Michelle Avis conducted the other half of the study on Cape Cod, Massachusetts. The project was specifically designed to look at piping plover flight patterns across their breeding grounds. The results of the study could have implications for the management of coastal wind turbine development. (more…)

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Posted in Beach Nesting Birds, Shorebirds, Wildlife Protection | Comments Off on Overview of piping plover flight behavior research