All three snowy plover chicks at Carpinteria State Beach are still going strong. I shot this video of them and their dad this morning.
Maximum cuteness.
Are… are they chasing fleas? How could you stand being on that beach?!
Well, they’re sometimes called sand fleas, or sandhoppers. But they’re mellow little jumping amphipods. See https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talitridae. No biting of humans involved.
Those are the clear-ish jumping thingies. The smaller dark things are kelp flies, also quite benign.
People sometimes complain about wrack (washed up seaweed) and the invertebrates that associate with it. They prefer a raked, sanitized beach devoid of as much non-human life as possible. I hold a different opinion, as do plovers.
It was their beach for a long time before we moved in and started waging ecocide.
Glad to hear that they don’t bite humans! I spent yesterday dodging houseflies, and did get stung by some mystery evil smaller fly while trying to get to a wetland. Didn’t spot a single bird, and I’m no good with audio.
I just found and read your blog post cataloguing these plovers from egg to toddler, and man I am rooting for them. The single father of newborn triplets fighting off a gull like 20 times his size to keep it from eating his babies! What drama!
Glad to hear you’re rooting for them! Everyone at the campground by that beach has been super into them. The local paper ran a story today calling the birds celebrities. 🙂
This entry was posted by jbc on Thursday, June 17th, 2021 at 9:50 pm and is filed under Tumblr.
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