Expensive Taste

Marauding mink plunders plover nest in Stone Harbor Point
By BRIAN IANIERI Staff Writer, (609) 463-6713
Press of Atlantic City
Published: Wednesday, July 18, 2007

STONE HARBOR — Eggs of one of the state’s most expensive birds were eaten by minks, whose fur produces some of the world’s most expensive coats.
And this in one of New Jersey’s most expensive seaside resort towns.

State environmental officials said they believe a mink ate the eggs in two and perhaps three piping plover nests located on Stone Harbor Point.

But the appearance of the soft, furry, semi-aquatic mammal represents just one of the problems this year with piping plovers on Stone Harbor Point.

A combination of flooding and hungry laughing gulls and foxes have hurt the nesting season in the quiet, sandy habitat located in the southern end of Stone Harbor, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Environmental Protection said Tuesday.

“(It’s) not going as well as we had hoped,” said Darlene Yuhas, spokeswoman for the DEP’s Division of Fish and Wildlife.
To date, 17 nesting pairs of the tiny shorebirds produced three young, she said. Other hatches are pending, as are census results.

Piping plover eggs can prove easy fare for wildlife eyeing the early-bird menu. To combat this, biologists place cages that wrap around the nests to limit cats and raccoons, for example.

But the mink, officials believe, was small enough to sneak through the cage.

“We have predator issues at all of our sites. In this case, based on tracks that were observed at the scene, evidently we did lose some eggs to a mink,” Yuhas said.

“Most predators can’t get through that caging, but in some cases very small ones can. It doesn’t happen too often, but it has happened before,” Yuhas said. “We have had minks destroy nests previously, so it’s not unprecedented, but it hasn’t happened very often.”

New Jersey considers the piping plover endangered.

Federal preliminary estimates from 2006 listed 116 nesting pairs in New Jersey.

The tiny piping plovers were listed as federally endangered and threatened in 1986, depending which of three North American locations they breed.

Their protection warrants extensive and costly efforts on both the federal and state levels.

Meanwhile, the traces of a mink was somewhat of a surprise at Stone Harbor Point, although minks are around.

The state identifies the population of minks as stable.

State Fish and Wildlife in 2005 and 2006 reported trappers harvested 1,656 minks.

Stone Harbor Point is located in an area away from houses and roads and on the outskirts of the bathing beaches.

The nesting area is roped off to prevent pedestrians from trouncing on the sand that serves as habitat for piping plovers, black skimmers and least terns.

Nesting wildlife have also witnessed another odd occurrence last month.

In the space of nine days, two small airplanes toting advertisements made emergency landings on Stone Harbor Point. Officials said no wildlife was injured in either case.

To e-mail Brian Ianieri at The Press:BIanieri@pressofac.com