Plover Love

     Today I had the pleasure of leading an outing for the Feminist Bird Clue and NYC Plover Project. After about an hour out, the show really began, with some plovers really showing off all their behaviors that occur this time in the season.
    Important to know is that NYC Plover has an info session this Tuesday, April 18 on zoom and training for new volunteers on Saturday May 6th, with delicious burritos to be served (if you need convincing beyond birds). Learn more about both of these opportunities here: https://nycploverproject.org/volunteer 

    It was a good afternoon out at the beach today...

In just one small area we observed 4 piping plovers. This one was a snoozer. Literally. Slept in this very spot while a pair of plover fought off a rival and made some scrapes together.

One of the plover pair. This one is the male.

This is the female.

Male is top and female is bottom. He has a thicker, darker neck ring and more orange on his beak.

The male, in a quick preen of their feather. Like he was prepping himself for something...

...oh.

A (comical) part of piping plover courtship is the male doing these (very) rapid high kicks, eventually flicking his feet at the tail of the female. 
And when I say rapid, photos do not do it justice, those feet are flicking at what seems like more than 5 kicks per second. Makes the Rockettes look like a junior varsity kick line.

The female seems absolutely entranced by his kicks?
Her posture to me says, "sigh, let's get this over with..."

Then after many tiny flick-like kicks, he got atop her...

...and sat there.
For a kind of long time.

Then once it looked like they had perfected a balancing act for the big ring, he swiveled his tail, flapped, and very "gracefully" shoved his mates head into the sand as he "made contact."
Bird mating is pretty unceremonious, usually just a quick touch of their bums and he, well, you know how it goes, I hope.

Unceremonious, like I said.

Now, to get back up...

Can't help but think, she's just like, "What. was that."

Then they do this little stand up, post roll in the sand, face-off, and then go about their regular business.

And then as if it couldn't get better, as the fog rolled in, we saw Clark Kent (plover #5 for the day) and at our end point, we got plover #6, flying by and vocalizing.
A stellar show for some perspective volunteers. Something I had never witnessed, I can't wait to spend time with them again this summer!