Piping plovers and the April 1 beach closures

The piping plover is a small shorebird the color of dry sand, and it nests in a shallow scrape on the upper beach, above the high-tide line and below the dune grass, from April into August. Eggs and chicks are camouflaged so well that people step on them, and a chick cannot fly for about its first month. A dog that runs the upper beach flushes the adults off the nest, and eggs or chicks left uncovered chill or are taken by gulls.

The plover is listed as threatened under the federal Endangered Species Act and protected under the Massachusetts Endangered Species Act, and MassWildlife oversees the state's nesting beaches. In practice, the fenced nesting areas marked with posts, string and signs are closed to people and dogs by law, and harassing a nesting bird carries penalties beyond a beach fine. On Cape Ann the nests sit on the wide beaches with dunes behind them, Good Harbor and Wingaersheek first.

A plover-season beach walk is a walk on the wet sand. Keep the dog between the water and the wrack line, away from the upper beach where the scrapes are, and clip the leash on well before the posts and string come into view. An adult feeding at the tide line with chicks behind it is the nest you cannot see, so a bird that runs ahead and keeps stopping is a bird to turn away from.

The even-numbered days of March, the last dog days at Good Harbor, are the ones to be most careful on, because the first birds can arrive before the closure begins. Our how-to on long-line recall and the how-to on drop it are the two skills that matter here. Plover monitors and the city's beach staff can ask you to leash or leave; the answer is yes.

The Good Harbor and Wingaersheek pages each carry the dated rule and the source, and the Cape Ann dog beach calendar puts every town's dates on one page so an April walk goes to the right sand. Gloucester's neighborhood beaches page covers Plum Cove and Cressy, and the Gloucester leash law page explains the ordinance the plover closure sits inside.

The seals, plovers and porcupines page is the wider wildlife walk, including the seals that haul out on the same beaches in spring. Our journal note on what this plover season taught our beach-day routine is the team's own account from the sand. The Gloucester beach page and MassWildlife are the sources for the rules; we describe them at the time of writing.