Nebraskaland Magazine
Contributed by Lauren Dinan, Nongame Bird Biologist
Erwin has been spotted again! As many of you know, Erwin is our famous Piping Plover that hatched at a lakeshore housing development in Dodge County, Nebraska, in June 2011. Over the last 4½ years we have been tracking Erwin’s movements across the United States. We are able to track Erwin’s movements because we placed colored leg bands on Erwin when she was a 3-day old chick back in 2011. We have tracked Erwin’s movements by monitoring her and all the Piping Plovers nesting along the Lower Platte River in eastern Nebraska during the breeding season and by receiving reports from citizen scientist across the United States during the non-breeding season. The graphic below provide a brief history of Erwin’s escapades (click the graphic to enlarge).
Erwin was first sited at Bunche Beach, FL in November 2011 and has been observed there every winter since then. We just received our most recent report of Erwin from Meg Rousher on October 30th, 2015. This is the 64th winter observation of Erwin.
Thanks to all of the individuals that have reported Erwin and other color banded plovers observed along the coast during the non-breeding season.
