. . . October 1995
Hello, young plovers,
wherever you are . . .
By Sally Pobojewski
Twenty-one pairs of piping plovers nesting on the northern beaches of Lake Michigan this summer have given researchers at the U-M Biological Station hope that this once-common inhabitant of the Great Lakes area may be making a comeback.
The Great Lakes’ piping plover population dwindled from about 200 pairs at the turn of the century to only 11 in the early 1980s. Since then, researchers at the U-M Biological Station near Pellston, working closely with the US Fish and Wildlife Service and state agencies, have kept close watch on the last of Michigan’s disappearing plovers. Students and scientists have banded birds, made detailed observations, set up protective predator exclusion cages, and served as "plover stewards" to divert people and pets from nesting areas during the summer breeding season.