Piping Plover

Related Bird Resources Plovers Shorebirds Types of Birds

The Piping Plover (Charadrius melodus), a pip of a plover with a small body, small beak and flashy orange legs, looks even more attractive during the summer when a dark stripe appears above the eyes and across the chest.

Once a quintessential shorebird of the Atlantic and Gulf Coast winter seasons, Piping Plover populations decreased in the Post WW II era, due largely to human encroachment on their breeding territory. By 1986 the population levels decreased to the point of requiring protection under the Endangered Species Act.

Three different breeding populations, the Great Lakes, the Northern Great Plains Population and the Atlantic Coast, receive protection, with the Great Lakes population listed as endangered and the remaining two populations listed as threatened.

© 2009 Patricia A. Michaels