Year of the Oystercatcher | Audubon

Hurricanes wreak havoc on coastal communities, inflicting flooding and property injury and placing human lives in danger. The 2024 Atlantic Hurricane Season proved extraordinarily damaging in Florida, with three landfalling storms contributing to one of many costliest seasons so far. Nonetheless, one yr later, as human communities proceed rebuilding, coastal hen populations are thriving within the storm-altered panorama. In 2025, the Audubon Florida group recorded a number of American Oystercatchers nesting in habitat that was human-made or altered by the 2024 hurricanes.

BACKGROUND

American Oystercatchers (Haematopus palliatus) are massive, black-and-white shorebirds with lengthy, pink legs, shiny yellow eyes, and a charismatic orange invoice. The invoice is distinctive in its shade in addition to its kind—it’s lengthy and chisel-shaped to allow the birds to adeptly maneuver and hammer open the shells of their favourite meals: oysters, clams, and mussels.

Breeding in coastal areas alongside the Atlantic Flyway and across the Gulf Coast, oystercatchers sometimes construct their nests straight on seashores in sandy or shelly areas with restricted vegetation. To achieve success, they need to nest close to the place they’ll discover ample meals sources, equivalent to amongst dunes, on islands in salt marshes, or on dredge spoil islands, and wish area to position their nests above the excessive tide line to keep away from overwash, or flooding from tides or ship wakes. Nonetheless, as shorelines slim and appropriate habitat disappears, oystercatchers are more and more compelled to nest nearer to the excessive tide line, the place their eggs are weak to erosion and storm surge, resulting in many nests washing away earlier than they hatch.

“Though storms are damaging to human infrastructure, the wind and wave motion assist to construct sand deposits alongside the shore and reset vegetated shorelines to create open sandy habitat that many beach-nesting birds want,” says Audrey DeRose-Wilson, Audubon’s director of hen conservation.

Nationwide, American Oystercatcher numbers declined severely within the nineteenth century, then began to get better. Sadly, the birds have since skilled habitat loss and disturbance to their beach-nesting and feeding grounds. Different threats embody sea degree rise and predators, lots of that are lured to seashores by human actions.

All instructed, American Oystercatchers are experiencing more difficult circumstances and have misplaced 50% of their inhabitants previously 5 many years. Scientists estimate round 10,000 people are remaining nationwide, with solely 419 breeding adults estimated to be in Florida. Conservation organizations like Audubon hope to construct on latest steady inhabitants traits to extend their numbers.

SOUTHWEST FLORIDA

Barrier islands in Collier County host a number of species of beach-nesting birds, together with Wilson’s Plover, Least Tern, and Black Skimmer. In Could, Shorebird Program Supervisor Megan Hatten was shocked to see a pair of American Oystercatchers arrange a nest on a sand spit often called Dickman’s Shoals, simply north of Marco Island throughout the Rookery Bay Nationwide Estuarine Analysis Reserve.

“This location has been increase over the previous few years, from simply low-lying sandbars to a full shoreline,” says Hatten. “Final yr, the three hurricanes introduced in additional sand and constructed the realm up increased, and in addition eliminated the taller native vegetation within the space,” she added.

Dickman’s Shoals had been coated in railroad vine, however after three storm occasions overwashed the situation, the sand is extra open, with clumps of sea oats as a substitute of being coated by railroad vine. Mixed with its distant location away from the mainland, it turned the right alternative for YA6, a two-year-old American Oystercatcher that hatched up the coast at Fort De Soto and was banded by biologists in 2023.

In accordance with Hatten, that is probably YA6’s first nest, and in response to the Florida Shorebird Database, the primary American Oystercatcher nest recorded in Collier County.

The nest did effectively and reached its hatch date with each dad and mom doing an excellent job incubating two eggs; nevertheless, Hatten and her group by no means noticed any chicks and consider Fish Crows or different predators could have preyed on them. There’s excellent news, although: Land managers with the Florida Division of Environmental Safety eliminated Australian pines simply throughout the lagoon, which ought to imply there might be fewer crows within the space transferring ahead. Hatten says the pair remains to be round and has been seen just a few instances because the nest failed. She is optimistic they’ll attempt once more subsequent yr.

In Lee County, Audubon assisted with the creation of a brand new stewardship program at Cayo Costa State Park in 2023, which ended up being the location of Lee County’s solely profitable American Oystercatcher nest that yr. Hatten stories that two chicks fledged from Cayo Costa in 2025.

TAMPA BAY REGION

Over the previous few years, American Oystercatcher pairs nesting throughout the Florida Coastal Islands Sanctuaries have had various success in fledging younger. Coastal Biologist Aaron White, like Hatten, reported {that a} mixture of storm surge and erosion from the 2024 hurricanes created naked nesting habitat safely above the tide line, notably at a spoil island known as Dredge Materials Administration Space 3D. Oystercatchers took benefit of it.

In 2025, 5 pairs nested there, and 4 of these nests fledged chicks. Two pairs nested above rocky riprap in sandy areas that have been cleared of vegetation, every fledging at the very least one chick.

“Oystercatchers have been in a position to increase much more chicks at 3D,” mentioned White. “They fledged a complete of six chicks, which was equal to the three earlier years mixed,” he added.

Along with elevated availability of nesting habitat, White famous that chicks sought out shade within the particles deposited by hurricanes on 3D’s shore.

FLORIDA PANHANDLE

Early within the 2025 season, excessive tides from unnamed storms washed over some seashores and islands within the Panhandle, the place nesting oystercatchers equally skilled a better-than-average yr. Apalachicola Shorebird Steward Zach Matchinski recorded two American Oystercatcher nests on Flag Island Important Wildlife Space, with chicks fledging from each nests.

“The primary nest we have been watching had three eggs,” says Matchinski, who later noticed that all the nest cup and eggs had turn out to be inundated by the tides. He anticipated the nest to be misplaced, however just a few weeks later, whereas counting Black Skimmer nests within the colony, the group occurred to see two little oystercatcher chicks operating round! They have been thrilled to verify that each chicks fledged.

The second nest was in a a lot better location, on high of a vegetated hill, so it did not have any drawback with excessive tides. The group discovered it with three eggs and confirmed that at the very least a type of chicks fledged.

Close by, American Oystercatchers sometimes nested efficiently on the St. George Island Causeway, which is what stays of an previous causeway that was changed by a bridge. In 2024, hurricanes inundated components of the causeway’s seawall and eliminated a lot of the adjoining vegetation, creating open sandy areas. Col Lauzau, Audubon’s Panhandle shorebird program supervisor, reported a superb yr on the Causeway in 2025, with six to seven pairs nesting and most fledging a number of chicks.

CONCLUSION

In a yr of large habitat loss attributable to rising water and hurricanes, American Oystercatchers in lots of areas benefited from coastal adjustments, utilizing the freshly overwashed sand and small pockets of human-made habitat to boost their younger.

Do your half to assist oystercatchers survive and thrive:

• Give nesting birds at the very least 100 toes of distance or as a lot as potential.
• Respect posted indicators and areas closed for beach-nesting birds.
• Keep away from strolling by flocks of birds on the seaside. 
• If pets are permitted on seashores, maintain them leashed and effectively away from birds.
• Take away trash and meals scraps, which are a magnet for predators that will even eat birds’ eggs and/or chicks. 
• Correctly eliminate fishing line and kit.
• Don’t drive on seaside dunes or different nesting areas.