A piping plover on Popham Beach in Maine. Their nesting areas are cordoned off to protect the birds and their hatchlings.
Not all of Maine's beaches have had the same treatment. Powerful storms this winter tore chunks out of the shoreline, battering private homes, piers and shorebirds' nesting sites. And as a warming climate pushes up sea levels and drives more extreme storms, Zitske said that the future success of threatened shorebirds depends on how humans adapt.
The plover population in Maine was down to just a handful of breeding pairs back in the early 1980s. Last year, nearly 160 nesting pairs were sighted.
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