Piping Plovers Inspire Volunteer Conservationists Despite New Threats From the Trump Administration
Proposed changes to the Endangered Species Act and park staffing cuts are putting the endangered coastal bird in danger.
The post Piping Plovers Inspire Volunteer Conservationists Despite New Threats From the Trump Administration appeared first on The Revelator.
For a piping plover, access to safe habitat means the difference between merely staying alive and preparing for the next generation.
Chris Allieri knows this dynamic all too well. He saw the federally endangered shorebirds — and the drama around protecting their breeding habitat — up close for the first time in 2020 during the coronavirus pandemic.
“I saw people up on the dunes, kites, drones, off-leash dogs,” he says. No one was paying any attention to the birds’ need for a protected space. “There were no signs, there was no fencing.” He says he “couldn’t believe” the petite-sized birds were essentially left to fend for themselves.
Allieri’s epiphany led to the creation of the NYC Plover Project, the first volunteer nonprofit in New York City dedicated to the birds. A communications professional by trade, he now spends most of his free time as the unpaid executive director of the nonprofit, where he has four paid employees on staff.
The heart of the program, Allieri says, lies in the hundreds of volunteers who care for the piping plovers every day of their nesting season, from March to September, after which the birds and their young head down the coast.
Similar stories unspool across the country.
Piping plovers (Charadrius melodus) have found their home across the beaches of the United States, trailing down the Atlantic coast, around the Great Lakes, into the northern Great Plains. Between nesting and migrating, piping plovers can be seen and heard across dozens of U.S. states, dashing across the sand in quick spurts of energy and sounding off with their signature bell-like peeps.
While the species remains federally endangered (they’re designated as “threatened” in the Atlantic Coast and Great Plains), the piping plovers’ population have been rebounding in some areas due to the stewardship of wildlife agencies, as well as various volunteer groups.
But even with those major conservation wins, piping plovers today face a new challenge: the Trump administration.
Cuts and ‘Harm’
Allieri points to firings at federal agencies that manage national parks and public lands as a threat to plover management.
Conservation experts in Michigan warned that piping plovers “will die” due to the administration’s cuts, as reported by MLive.
In Maine staff levels for U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service partners were down in 2025, which required Maine Audubon and other nonfederal partners to do more work, according to Laura Minich Zitske, director of Maine Audubon’s coastal birds project. The organization’s funding for 2025 was set in 2023, but Minich Zitske says they are “anxiously waiting” to see how funding plays out for next season.
On top of budgetary and personnel issues, the Trump administration has also proposed a rollback of the Endangered Species Act, the foundational law that has provided a critical safety net to protecting threatened species and their habitats.
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The Trump administration wants to change the way the law is interpreted, specifically the definition of the word “harm.” Historically the law has upheld harm to include any attacks on a species’ habitat. Now the administration is looking to narrow that definition to only recognize killing the protected species.
“Harming habitat is also harming endangered species,” says Jewel Tomasula, national policy director of the Endangered Species Coalition, an environmental nonprofit that helps connect conservation groups like the NYC Plover Project to the national network of conservation groups to share strategies. “Species need a safe place to live. They need places to find food, to reproduce, and that is so integral to species survival,” she says. “Habitat loss is also the driving factor for extinction for [the] majority of species, especially our terrestrial species.”
Problems for Plovers
This potential definition change is really concerning to the NYC Plover Project, says Allieri.
“A plover without habitat cannot exist. A plover doesn’t just go to another beach. It doesn’t just go to a wetland or go to a marsh. It doesn’t nest in a tree… This is a very specific species that has a very specific breeding range and it’s already been winded down to within an inch of its life to where it can survive.”
Allieri says the group already sees the birds having difficulties due to sea-level rise and narrowing beaches, which has caused competition within the species and with other beach-nesting birds.
“We’re seeing purgation of nests by other birds,” he adds. “We’re having a lot of nest loss early in the season, and this will only continue.”
Wherever conservationists work to protect wild species, uncertainty now runs high.
“It’s sort of hard to wrap our heads around all these challenges to the ESA could influence how we manage endangered species demands,” says Minich Zitske. She worries about the potential that the plovers’ habitats could be damaged while the birds are away on migration, which would not count as a violation of the ESA if the “harm” rule changes. Maine Audubon has been working to monitor piping plovers since 1981 and manages most of the nesting sites across the state with some help from their partners at the Rachel Carson Wildlife Refuge.
General concerns are echoed by the group’s volunteer base. “I do think that there is a perception that violations of the ESA will not be prosecuted or taken seriously,” says Minich Zitske. “This is a longstanding concern, but it has increased. Volunteers feel discouraged when they are working hard to help our most vulnerable species alive when those in power are reluctant to engage or enforce laws.”
The Importance of Volunteers
Out of all Maine Audubon’s efforts, more people volunteer to work with piping plovers than any other program. Some work as general monitors, while others focus on educating beachgoers or identifying new nesting sites.
“A lot of our volunteers are especially committed currently because they do want to demonstrate the public support for the Endangered Species Act,” says Minich Zitske.
The NYC Plover Project has also seen that wave of support for the birds grow over time.
“That first season we were really just like, ‘we have to get some boots on the ground.’ We have to get some volunteers out there [to] just help educate and to be arms and legs for the park service,” Allieri says.
They started with about a dozen volunteers but escalated quickly.
In their second season, they were named volunteer group of the year by the National Park Service, beating out groups from huge West Coast national parks.
Their fifth season — which just wrapped up — had an estimated 300 to 400 volunteers patrolling the stretch of beaches along the Rockaways and looking after about 100 piping plovers whose breeding sites are protected by temporary fencing or structures put up by the NYC Parks Department.
“We’ve done nearly 18,000 hours of volunteer time,” Allieri says.
Their volunteers are positioned at each end of the enclosure, sometimes from 6 in the morning till 9 o’clock at night.
Plovers Meet the Public
In addition to directly protecting the birds, the volunteers help spread the word about the species and efforts to protect them. “We’ve connected with literally tens of thousands of people who have come to the beaches in the Rockaways,” Allieri says.
If you live around an area with piping plovers, you may have heard some hate against the small birds, sometimes through the form of “piping plovers taste like chicken” bumper stickers.
Talking to people who don’t understand the necessity of plover enclosures is part of the job for volunteers across the nation. It occasionally causes debates about people not getting enough beach access due to the fenced-off sections.
That’s less of an issue in Maine, due to the state’s strong cultural wildlife values, according to Minich Zitske.
In New York City, an area known for its attitude and abundance of tourists, these conversations can get heated, but Allieri says that’s starting to change.
“Sometimes people show up to the beach ready to fight — like they’re ready to fight about a bird — but that’s fewer and far between,” he says. “I think with each season we are seeing more and more support and more and more advocacy on the part of everyday New Yorkers who really are rooting for the plover.”
NYC Plover Project volunteers are all trained in de-escalation tactics to address these sorts of situations, which includes giving folks the benefit of the doubt. Allieri thinks the majority of people — even those who are trying to bust volunteers’ chops — are reachable by introducing them to the bird. “We’re gonna be able to point out a piping plover and maybe even a chick or a fledgling to you,” he says.
Spreading Their Wings
As the NYC Plover Project grows, it’s expanding its programs to include more enhanced coastal ecosystem management and advocacy.
“Even though our core program of our volunteer engagement will always be with us, we are moving into public schools and we have a full education program,” Allieri says. “Then we also have community engagement with our local elected officials — not just on the federal level, but also city and state level as well.”
Allieri has less patience for elected officials who act like limited beach access or ditching controversial firework shows are merely “equity” issues.
“There’s some real public safety concerns out there,” Allieri says. “Dare I say, temporary beach closures are not on the list of injustices.”
As threats to endangered species ramp up, the NYC Plover Project is looking to do more year-round programming.
“We are realizing quickly that we are no longer just a seasonal operation,” Allieri says. “We haven’t been for years now.” They start to wrap up their volunteer recruitment at the end of the year, and by Jan. 1 they’re fully in the planning stages for next year. In the offseason, they keep the public engaged with a volunteer Slack channel, webinars, mailing lists, and their popular social media pages.
Part of their latest program expansion includes making the public aware of the similar battles various endangered species face.
“The piping plover has more in common with like grizzlies and gray wolves than most people know,” Allieri says. “Don’t tell [plovers] that they’re tiny. I think that they think that they’re grizzlies.” They’re currently working on a campaign that ties these similarities together.
While federal leadership’s actions may paint a different picture, the shorebirds have found support across party lines.
“In terms of the voters in the Rockaways, it is everybody from one of the most prevalent Trump-supporting districts to the opposite end of the spectrum,” Allieri says. “We are not hearing one word on the ground about the need to remove endangered species protections. There are a lot of Republican community members who come up to us on the beach and ask, ‘How are the plovers doing?’”
Flying Forward
While volunteers’ level of commitment is up to the individual, Allieri and Minich Zitske both voice worries about potential burnout, especially with the current attacks on endangered species.
“I have concerns that if this continues, at what point will people just start to give up? I don’t know. I hope not, but it’s hard to know the future, especially the way things are going,” Minich Zitske says.
Still, even with what sometimes feels like an unsustainable dedication level, Allieri is certain that people will keep showing up for piping plovers, even if the harm definition change is enacted.
“What would the plover want us to do? The plover would want us to fight like hell. That’s what we have to do right now.”
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Previously in The Revelator:
Studies: Extreme Weather Fueled by Climate Change Is Adding to Bird Declines
The post Piping Plovers Inspire Volunteer Conservationists Despite New Threats From the Trump Administration appeared first on The Revelator.
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