Organization: The Nature Conservancy

Lake/River Basin: Lake Superior, Lake Michigan, Lake Huron

Project Description: The Nature Conservancy and its partners are conducting a suite of activities aimed at increasing reproductive success, as well as increasing the quality of Great Lakes piping plover (Charadrius melodus) nesting habitat. The effective conservation and management of Great Lakes piping plover populations necessitates a multifaceted approach due to myriad threats facing this endangered species.

Specifically this project is designed to: a) survey potential plover habitat for nesting pairs; b) identify, map and remove invasive plant species that directly limit availability of habitat in and around plover breeding territories; c) intensively monitor at least six breeding territories and associated nests with the goal of decreasing nest depredation due to natural and anthropogenic causes; d) provide educational information to visitors near plover nesting sites; and e) salvage abandoned plover eggs for captive rearing and release of plover chicks.

These activities will be conducted for the 2008 and 2009 breeding seasons in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula and northern Lower Peninsula with the Captive Rearing Program supporting all piping plover nesting sites in the Great Lakes watershed.

Project partners include the Detroit Zoological Society, Central Lake Superior Land Conservancy, Lake Superior State University, Michigan Department of Natural Resources, USDA Hiawatha National Forest, American Zoo and Aquarium Association institutions, Little Traverse Conservancy, and Wild Shores.

	Agency staff and volunteers build enclosures that allow adult plovers to pass easily while protecting the eggs from predators. With this protection, hatch rates increased from about 30% to over 70%, making it one of the most successful strategies for protecting piping plovers. Photo by Mark Hubinger, Grand Marais, Mich., 2009.
	Piping plover chicks are “precocial” – able to run around and feed themselves within hours of hatching. This 11-day old chick is finding small invertebrates along the Lake Michigan shore. Photo by Alice Van Zoeren.
	The Captive Rearing Program, coordinated by the Detroit Zoological Society for the past nine years, hatches and raises abandoned or salvaged eggs/chicks throughout the U.S. portion of the Great Lakes. The chicks are released with wild-reared chicks. Photo courtesy of the Detroit Zoological Society.