Piping Plover

My water color of a rare bird. Piping plovers like to make thier nests on the shore and the eggs are vulnerable to predators and even to people who may step on the eggs while strolling along the shores. I saw a piping plover in Grand Haven Michigan along the sandy shore, but not recently.

Summer Time on the Great Lakes

Delight.  Happiness. Joy.  Kids love to play in water and run on the sand and build castles.  That’s what this time of the year is about around the Great Lakes. People relax to the sounds of the waves and see the blues and greens of the water. 

We share these waters with many species of birds.  Sometimes we can see the American bald eagles scavenging the beaches for dead fish or we may see other species such as the rare piping plover.

Read about the Great Lakes in my book, The Dynamic Great Lakes available at Barnes & Noble, Schulers Books and Music, The Bookman and many other stores on the web and elsewhere.

 

The Great Lakes Imprint In Us

Leave the Great Lakes?

Never.

We feel their pulse in our blood,

in our sinews, our bones.

vibrations in our bellies.

Their islands arise in waking dreams.

And even in sleep we know

moon, stars and planets float in their waters

until dawn.

The Great Lakes gulp the sun at noon

while diatom symphonies

dazzle green currents

and curious protozoa graze.

In silent depths below

lie burbot, sturgeon, lake trout.

White sailboats belly out in the breeze.

On the beach rare piping plovers

hide their nests among stones.

We walk through singing sands,

scoop pails of water,

build spirit castles of wet sand.

Then we brush sand from our feet

and our hands.

The lakes’ imprint is in us.

From The Wilderness Within

the watercolor is a piping plover

Poem and watercolor by Barbara Spring