Dear PiPl Friends,

I wanted to share with you two things of beauty for Easter Sunday –

This image of three Piping Plovers eggs in the sand is one of my forever favorite PLover nests. The nest was located in the most impossibly dangerous area, dangerous because it was on a highly crowded beach several feet from a City sidewalk. Not only that, as you can see from the photo, it was fully out in the open; not near a patch of beach grass or piece of driftwood, stone, or shell. The new, inexperienced PLover parents had not added a single bit of broken shell or pebble to line the nest either. Like all Plover parents though, they did sit on the eggs night and day. Unlike many PiPl parents, when danger arose, they did not leap up and try to distract the predator, but sat very, very still, camouflaged in the naked sand by their sheer stillness.

We who were aware of the nest had serious doubts as to whether or not the eggs would survive the plethora of crows and dogs off leash that frequent this beach. Miracle of miracles, all three chicks hatched. And all three grew to fly and to migrate.

Our Charlotte is seven and like all grandparents the world over, we think she is tops. She writes and illustrates these sort of sing-songy poems and for Easter she wrote one each for myself, her Grandfather, and her Dad. Here is mine –

the trees told the bushes and
the bushes told the flowers
and the flowers told the rain
and the rain told the sun
and the sun told the clouds
Happy Easter! Spring is Here!

Time to add Emily Dickinson to our nightly bedtime reading I think.

Easter greetings of joy to you.
xxKim