1 of 3 endangered piping plover chicks that scuttled Mamby music fest dies

One of three piping plover chicks, whose federally endangered status helped scuttle a major music festival at Montrose Beach, has died.

The piping plover chick was brought to the Lincoln Park Zoo Saturday morning when members of the Chicago birding community, who for weeks have volunteered to stand guard at the nest during daylight hours, noticed the chick was not moving normally.

“At first the volunteers couldn’t find the third chick because it had been tucked under its father’s wing,” said Carl Giometti, president of the Chicago Ornithological Society.

One of the volunteers brought the chick to the Lincoln Park Zoo to be checked out.

“Despite supportive care all day and into the evening by veterinary staff of the Lincoln Park Zoo, the 11-day-old plover chick did not survive,” according to a statement issued by the Illinois Department of Natural Resource.

It died within 24 hours of being brought to the zoo, according to Louise Clemency, field supervisor for the Chicago office of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

The Lincoln Park Zoo will conduct a necropsy and tissue studies “in hopes that we can better understand the circumstances surrounding the sudden change in health,” according to the statement.

The chick was running around and seemed to be acting normally in the days leading up to its death, according to Leslie Borns, the longtime volunteer steward of the Montrose Beach Dunes, adjacent to the plovers’ sandy nest.

“It’s very sad,” she said. “But, truthfully, even one chick surviving is considered a good outcome for these birds.”

Foul play is not suspected, Clemency said. The two other chicks seem to be doing fine, for the moment.

“The statistics say that you’re probably going to lose at least one or two chicks, but it’s still a bummer,” Giometti said, noting that a fourth potential plover sibling never hatched from its egg.

The chick’s mother migrated south over the weekend, leaving parenting duties to dad — a normal development, Clemency said.

A previous batch of four eggs from the same plover parents were transported last month to a hatching facility in Northern Michigan because rising lake waters threatened their nest. None of the eggs hatched.