Snowy Plovers

[ Excerpted from SBN-P Editorial, 8/12/2005 ]

Road to recovery at Coal Oil Point

OUR OPINION


News-Press article in 2001 delivered encouraging environmental news:

"For the first time in more than 30 years," the story read, "scientists have found snowy plover chicks on the beach at UCSB's Coal Oil Point Reserve, a discovery that gives researchers hope the area could again flourish as a breeding ground for the tiny birds."

... fast-forward from 2001 to the beach at Coal Oil Point today. Get out your binoculars, and with the assistance of a docent, you'll see dozens of Western snowy plovers and chicks. You'll see the father plovers watching over their offspring. You'll see the tiny birds running out of the fenced off areas down to the water.

And you'll see one of the more successful -- but largely unheralded -- stories of environmental stewardship on the South Coast...

What's inspiring about the Coal Oil Point program is that it's been able to operate a year-round docent program, to watch over the birds and educate the public, with relatively little help from government agencies and nonprofit groups.

About 400 plovers winter there, but it's the return of the area as a nesting site over the last five summers that is increasing optimism that the species is beginning to recover.

The members of the News-Press editorial board last week toured the site with Docent Coordinator Jennifer Stroh and Santa Barbara City Councilman Das Williams, who volunteers weekly as a docent. Mr. Williams also helped guard the plovers that unexpectedly nested at the Santa Barbara Harbor sand spit this summer...

But the story of the plovers at Coal Oil Point is... a living example of the kind of environmental stewardship the South Coast was known for in the '60s and '70s.


Road to recovery at Coal Oil Point