Piping Plover chick silhouette - New Jersey

Few days old Piping Plover chick exploring the beach at sunrise:

Piping Plover chick with a rising sun behind it showing off its down feathers - New Jersey

Even though this particular beach wasn’t as productive as I had originally hoped, after finding a lone family of Piping Plovers with just hatched chicks, I decided to come back again but this time before the sunrise to try to photograph it as the sun was coming up. It was a huge gamble as there was no guarantee that I will find them 24 hours later. There was no guarantee that the chicks will be cooperative enough to walk on the beach at sunrise, on and on and on 😜 As you can see, taking risks sometimes pays off as I got a photo that I had envisioned the day before🤩

Something I didn’t realize before is how “hairy” these young birds really are 😂 The backlit scene shows off the fuzz of their down feathers pretty well, don’t you think? 😍

Vertical crop of a fuzzy Piping Plover ( Charadrius melodus ) chick on the beach - New Jersey

One thing I cannot decide is which crop I like the most.

Which crop do you prefer?

To me each one is unique on its own…

Close-up of a two day Piping Plover chick - NJ shore — Close-up of a one day Piping Plover chick - NJ shore

I’ve never realized how fuzzy/hairy these chicks are until I photographed them with a light behind them 🤩

Enjoying my posts?

Consider buying me a coffee to keep me awake while creating another post 😁

Thank you!

You can also find me on:

- Instagram: greggardphoto

- Youtube: gregsthings

- Facebook: greg.gard.9

- Twitter: newtobirding

- Full disclosure: This post contains references to products from Amazon.com and I may receive small compensation when you purchase a product via my affiliate link on this website. I'm very grateful for any purchase you make using one of my links. No personal data is shared with me -

Here are some of my favorite shorebird guides for a quick read (to save money buy used books):