FIGHTING FOR SURVIVAL Mountain Plover

Photo: Oklahoma State University

PRAIRIE DOG DEPENDENT The mountain plover is one of many species that depends on prairie dog colonies in the West. The plover is struggling with the loss of nesting sites in prairie dog towns. All five species of prairie dog have suffered dramatic declines and occupy only about 2 percent of their former ranges, yet wholesale poisoning and shooting of prairie dogs continues. When mountain plovers attempt to use alternative nest sites outside of prairie dog towns, it often ends badly. For example, farm equipment can destroy plover nests on untilled fields. Birds that renest after the fields are planted soon find themselves surrounded by too-tall vegetation and abandon their nests. Even successful nesting sites may not produce many plover chicks—plover nests are shallow depressions in the ground, and though the dark olive and black eggs are well-camouflaged, they are vulnerable to predators such as coyotes, swift foxes, and ground squirrels. Every year, nearly half of the plover flocks’ nests are lost to predators.

A BIRD ON THE BRINK Increasing human development in plover habitat and continued persecution of prairie dogs have taken their toll on the mountain plover. In addition to losing their preferred nesting sites in the Rocky Mountains and Great Plains, the wide-ranging birds are suffering from the conversion of their winter habitat to vineyards, orchards, and urban development in California. The species has declined by over 66 percent in the past few decades. Most nesting occurs in Colorado, Montana, and Wyoming; there is now substantially less breeding in their former habitats in Arizona, Kansas, Nebraska, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Texas, and Mexico, and the plover is extinct in Utah. Recent estimates place the plover population at 5,000-11,000 individuals, a small number for a bird that lives just two years on average.

KNOW YOUR PLOVER • Quick on the Uptake. Upon hatching, plover chicks can almost immediately run and feed themselves. • Double Duty. The mountain plover may be egalitarian as far as chick- rearing is concerned: there is some evidence that female plovers lay a second clutch that they attend to while a male incubates the first clutch.