Cedar Island Piping Plover Technician Assistant
State Role Title: Natural Resource Spec II
Hiring Range: Hourly wage is $17.23
Pay Band: 3
Agency: Dept of Wildlife Resources
Location: Accomack County Territory
Agency Website: www.dwr.virginia.gov
Recruitment Type: General Public - G
Job Duties
Piping plover (PIPL) productivity in Virginia has been declining since 2016 and a clear cause has not been identified. Impeded access to foraging habitat has been identified as a contributing factor to low productivity on some islands. Cedar Sandbar is an area located on the north end of Cedar Island, one of Virginia's barrier islands, that is owned by the Commonwealth of Virginia. It has a series of backside mudflats where PIPL broods were previously known to forage successfully. In the last 5 years, vegetation has increasingly impeded PIPL brood access to these productive foraging flats forcing the adults to bring just-hatched chicks to the ocean intertidal to feed where they are susceptible to avian predation. Moreover, depending on the nest location, getting to the ocean intertidal entails traversing a wide beach and going through seabird nesting areas that support predatory gulls and terns. To reestablish brood access to the backside flats, vegetation-free corridors were created between the nesting beach and the foraging flats. This position will help monitor the use of corridors and backside mudflats by PIPL parental adults and broods and assess brood survival.
This wage position will assist the PIPL lead technician with the monitoring of PIPL breeding productivity and corridor use on Cedar Sandbar. The successful incumbent will also help maintain corridor and mudflat cameras and retrieve and review camera footage throughout the season. The successful candidate may also be tasked with helping collect prey samples from the backside flats. Nest monitoring efforts will include searching all suitable habitat on Cedar Sandbar for scrapes and nests and recording their locations. Each nest or brood will be monitored three times per week until the nest hatches or fails, or the brood fledges or disappears. Nest status and brood status and location will be recorded during each visit. Lastly, the successful candidate will help retrieve and review camera footage as soon nests begin to hatch.
Minimum Qualifications
The incumbent in this position will spend approximately 75% of their time assisting the PIPL lead technician with conducting nest searches, locating and marking nests, assisting with following nest success through hatching, and assisting with recording brood locations until the brood fledged or disappears. The remaining 25% will be spent assisting the PIPL lead technician with maintaining corridor and mudflat game cameras, retrieving and reviewing images throughout the breeding season, and collecting prey samples.
The following knowledge, skills and abilities (KSAs) are required for this position.
* Must have experience working with shorebirds and/or have a background in ornithology or general biology.
* Incumbent must be comfortable walking up to 10 miles per day in hot, buggy conditions.
* Incumbent must be comfortable traveling in small boats, being around water and must possess the ability to swim.
* Incumbent must have completed or be willing to complete an online boater’s safety course
* Incumbent must have a valid driver's license and must provide their own transportation outside of work hours.
Additional Considerations
* Experience making and recording detailed observations of avian behavior are preferred.
* Experience towing, launching and operating small motorboats in coastal inshore waters is a plus.
* Experience entering field data in Field Maps or a similar application and a proficiency with game cameras is also a plus.
Recent college/university graduates or students studying Wildlife Biology, Ecology, Natural Resources Management, or a related field, are encouraged to apply.
HOUSING INCLUDED for the successful incumbent.