Plovers Attack

Birds Work Together to Stage Assault on Bather in Hampton Bays

By Dan Rattiner

The Hampton Police have released the report of an attack on a five-year-old by piping plovers last Thursday on a beach in Hampton Bays. The child got away uninjured and shortly after the attack the birds dispersed. But it happened. Or may have happened.

“We only have the word of the parents of this little girl,” Hampton Chief Reynolds said at a press conference on Monday, indicating that the name of the child would not be given out at this time. “By the time the police got there, the piping plovers were skittering innocently around in a normal fashion on the beach as they always do, pecking at sand flies. Nothing appeared to be amiss.”

The Chief said, however, that he wanted to make this episode public to see if anyone else in the community has suffered an incident such as this.

According to the report, the parents and the toddler were lying on blankets under an umbrella when a small army of piping plovers skittered toward them from the left side of the beach in a menacing fashion. They tried to shoo the birds away — these are just four-inch long birds that are on the endangered species list — but there were so many of them that it had no effect.

They left the blanket quickly, and backed toward the right, only to find that it had been a trap, and there was another army of plovers just behind a dune who then proceeded to march forward toward them from the opposite direction. As the trap began to close, several of the more aggressive birds fluttered over and tried to peck at the little girl and at the ankles of the parents, but the parents picked up the little girl and quickly fled down a path at the back of the beach, only to pass still another army of plovers who were advancing toward the beach to block their path there.

“We got out just in time,” the mother breathlessly said to the police later.

The piping plovers are a small four-inch long white bird with grey wingtips and a white band around their necks. They are not to be confused with starlings or other shorebirds. The white band is the telltale mark of a plover.

Just 25 years ago, the piping plovers seemed headed for extinction. In 1982 they were labeled a “threatened species” on the endangered species list. Two years later, local groups began a major effort to find, shelter and protect the piping plovers during their vulnerable mating and child-rearing season. When a piping plover nest was found, a snow fence was placed around it and signs put up telling bathers to stay away from that particular beach or face a substantial fine. The snow fence would remain up from April to after the birds left the nest, which was usually not until in July or August.

In 1984, the number of piping plovers counted on our beaches was just 191 and just six beaches were fenced off. The count this year was over 400 with nearly half of all beaches in the Hamptons either entirely or partially closed because of plovers. In 2005, the Fourth of July Fireworks was cancelled at East Hampton Main Beach because of the plovers.

At the press conference, Chief Reynolds said that he would not be asking local residents to be on the lookout for aggressive plover behavior as a result of just one incident. He said this was the first time this behavior had involved bathers. But it was not the first time aggressive plover behavior had been seen in the Hamptons.

“It began two years ago,” he said. “One of our interns said he saw a group of about 50 piping plovers corner and then briefly attack a French poodle in Westhampton Beach. And last summer, there were two incidents. A group of plovers killed a seagull in Amagansett in July. And in August, several groups of plovers trapped and killed a red fox, which normally attacks THEM. And they did it by employing the same classical military tactics as they used this past Thursday in Hampton Bays.”

Beware of Plovers marching together in groups, he said.

Earlier this spring, with the apparent success of the Plover preservation program, there were certain people, East Hampton Town Supervisor Bill McGintee among them, who were pressing to have all the snow fences lifted since the job of saving plovers was done.

Now there is no further talking about removing the fences. As Chief Reynolds said, if there are more reports of plover attacks, it might be necessary to keep the fences up and post a guard to make sure the plovers don’t get out.

Or, if environmentalists object to that on the grounds that it is illegally confining creatures listed as endangered, perhaps the fences could be kept up with a guard posted outside to keep the bathers and sun worshippers inside and safe from the marauding piping plovers.

“We feel that if it comes to this,” the Chief said, “we have the manpower to safely escort sunbathers to these fenced in spots, so long as they stay close to the armed guards and move in groups as instructed.”

You’ve been warned.