Behavior
An inconspicuous bird of dry sandy beaches. Breeds in open sand, gravel, or shell-strewn beaches and alkali flats. Nest site is typically near small clumps of grass, drift, or other windbreak. In winter prefers sand beaches and mudflats. Migrants seldom seen inland but occasionally show up at lake shores, river bars, or alkali flats. Forages visually in typical plover fashion, employing and run-stop-scan technique. Captures prey by leaning forward and picking at surface. Also employs a "foot-tremble" feeding method, causing prey to move and become more conspicuous. Feeds by day and night. Eats a wide variety of aquatic marine worms, insects, mollusks, and crustaceans. Seldom found in large numbers except at a few favored wintering or staging sites, where numbers sometimes reach 100 or more. More typically seen in pairs or in groups of 3 or 4. When approached, more often runs than flies. Very aggressive when nesting.
Read more about this topic: Piping Plover
Famous quotes containing the word behavior:
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—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“There are ... two minimum conditions necessary and sufficient for the existence of a legal system. On the one hand those rules of behavior which are valid according to the system’s ultimate criteria of validity must be generally obeyed, and on the other hand, its rules of recognition specifying the criteria of legal validity and its rules of change and adjudication must be effectively accepted as common public standards of official behavior by its officials.”
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“The type of fig leaf which each culture employs to cover its social taboos offers a twofold description of its morality. It reveals that certain unacknowledged behavior exists and it suggests the form that such behavior takes.”
—Freda Adler (b. 1934)