Piping plovers in peril

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Piping plovers are small, gray and white shorebirds with a distinctive black ring around their necks and orange legs built for speed and agility. You've probably seen them scampering up and down the shoreline at low tide, foraging for a bit of breakfast as the waves ebb and flow.

According to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, piping plovers nest along the sandy shorelines and gravel beaches found on the Atlantic Coast, in the Great Lakes and in regions of the Northern Great Plains. These migratory shorebirds are threatened along the Atlantic Coast, which includes Delaware. This is mainly due to habitat loss from development and changing climate, as well as predators.

University of Delaware senior Lauren Pollock, a wildlife ecology and conservation major, from Middletown, Delaware, is exploring what factors affect the survival of piping plovers at Prime Hook National Wildlife Refuge in Milton, Delaware. Working with biologists Erin Betancourt and Susan Guiteras, Pollock is particularly interested in the contribution of nesting site selection to the migratory shorebird's survival. At UD, Pollock is advised by Greg Shriver, professor of wildlife ecology in the College of Agriculture and Natural Resources.