It also breeds in the Great Lakes region. It winters from North Carolina south to Florida and along the Gulf Coast. Piping plovers can be found on sandy beaches on the coast and in dry, sandy areas inland. Piping plovers eat marine worms, fly larvae, beetles, insects, crustaceans, mollusks and other small invertebrates. Charadrius Piping plovers court by flying over nesting territory.
Males select the nest site and defend it from other plovers.
He then starts scraping a nest in the sand. Both the male and female toss stones and shell fragments into the depression. The female piping plover usually lays four eggs. The eggs hatch in about a month and the chicks fledge when they are three to four weeks old. The parents don't feed the chicks.