Mamby on the Beach, the music festival that headed north and collided with the species-saving efforts of two federally endangered birds on Montrose Beach, is about a month away. But the piping plovers who have made the beach their summer home may not be going anywhere anytime soon.
On Wednesday night, a tiny plover chick was spotted on the beach. Two more hatched Thursday.
The chicks, not yet named, mark a major victory for plover pair Monty and Rose, as well as preservation efforts in Chicago. It’s the first time one of the birds has hatched in Cook County in more than 60 years, said Carl Giometti, president of the Chicago Ornithological Society.
“Everyone is hoping this becomes the next Chance the Snapper,” Giometti said Wednesday night. “Piping plover chicks are little poof balls, so everyone is certainly eager to get out there and check them out.”
Giometti said he hopes the success of the endangered birds breeding in the city, which the Chicago Park District helped happen, encourages the district to take seriously the requests in a petition to ban large concerts from Montrose.
As the temperature rose Thursday afternoon, Monty made a dash toward birdwatchers, scurrying up to the rock wall bordering the expanded protected area of the beach and leading just about everyone to take out their smartphones for a plover pic.
“It’s just amazing that it’s bringing so many people here to watch the birds. It really feels miraculous, knowing that they lost a clutch and they now have three chicks,” said Tamima Itani, a treasurer with the Illinois Ornithological Society.
Since Mamby’s move from Oakwood Beach on the South Side to Montrose was announced, birders and community stakeholders have kept up their fight to keep large-scale events away from Montrose. But details for a festival that will bring tens of thousands of people to the park Aug. 23 and 24 are still not finalized.
“It appears to me that Mamby on the Beach is going to happen,” said Paul Fehrenbacher, a board member of Montrose Dog Beach. “And if that’s the case, the two choices are to dig your feet in the sand and say, ‘I don’t want it, I don’t want it, I don’t want it.’ Or else you kind of deal with the situation at hand and try to make the best of it.
“We hope that there’s clarity in short order of where it’s actually going to be,” Fehrenbacher said.
A revised site plan, shared with community stakeholders after the July Park District board meeting, moves the three stage areas of the fest north and west of the plovers, between West Wilson Drive and West Lawrence Avenue.
The Park District said new plans address concerns that have been raised, especially involving the plovers, and takes into account a buffer zone between the birds’ nest and the music stages.
“This site plan moves Mamby from its original proposed site at Montrose Beach to parkland between Wilson and Lawrence,” according to a statement from the Park District. “We have also been working with U.S. Fish and Wildlife to ensure ample safe space for the Plovers and their nest. The District remains committed to managing parkland fairly for all users and is optimistic that an agreement will be reached that is reasonable for everyone.
“The Chicago Park District will perform the necessary reviews, including public safety, before the permit is issued,” the statement said.
But Marianne Lalonde, president of Lakeside Area Neighbors Association, said the new plan doesn’t erase problems, it just presents different ones.
“The volume of people that will be in our neighborhood is not sustainable for our area,” Lalonde said.
During the weekend Mamby is set to take place, there are also Cubs games, a triathlon and concerts at the Aragon in close proximity to the festival site, Lalonde said. “And while the environmental risks (with the new site plan) might be lower, they’re not gone,” she added.
Lalonde, reiterating a concern shared by other community stakeholders, said there’s also a social justice issue at play when there’s a charge to gain access to a park on free and public lakefront. “It really blocks people who are neighbors, who are taxpayers, who rely on the park,” she said. “It’s still very damaging overall.”
Fehrenbacher said he would rather the fest be moved north, even if it’s closer to the dog beach, than stay near the plovers and natural areas. He also said he hopes the fest can lead to an update of the dog beach — and a potentially dog-friendly festival.
Jill Niland, a member of the Montrose Lakefront Coalition, said she is still not happy that the festival moved to Montrose, and the group has sent questions and concerns about the new site plan to the Park District.
“And they may have plans to repeat it next year, so we would prefer to not have this set as a precedent,” Niland said.
At the Park District meeting this month, Jerry Mickelson of Jam Productions, the festival promoter, repeated his willingness to work with community groups.
Mickelson said Mamby is “more than a small boutique music festival,” noting it will provide jobs to locals and exposure to nonprofit organizations. Mickelson talked about a new site plan and reiterated that “it’s in our DNA to be good neighbors and we’ll work every day to make sure that happens.”
“We have said from day one that Mamby will make the necessary accommodations to protect the young piping plovers if they are still on the beach,” he said. “We have come up with multiple site plans. There is a version that moves the fest a bit farther north from the park, between Wilson and Lawrence, that does not block access to the beach.”
Mickelson did not respond to requests for comment about the new site plan, whether or not VIP ticket holders will still have access to the beach and if there’s a possibility of reverting to the old site plan if the plovers leave the beach.
Although captive-rearing programs are used to raise chicks when nests have been abandoned, there are no plans to remove the chicks or remaining eggs in the plovers’ second clutch as Mamby approaches.
Earlier, Mickelson sent emails, citing the success of piping plovers raised in captivity and the positive outcomes of conservation programs.
“Seems to me that increasing the odds of having more plovers breed and survive should be the #1 concern of everyone and not a music festival that has vowed not to disturb them,” Mickelson said in an email. “I don’t need to be a biologist to understand these percentages.”
But according to Louise Clemency, a field supervisor in the Chicago office of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the survival of chicks that were raised by their parents is higher in the long term than birds that were captive-reared.
“It’s our first priority to have the wild birds raise the chicks in the wild,” she said.
Last month, ahead of a storm and in the middle of a battle between promoters and stakeholders over the fest’s location, the plovers’ first clutch of eggs was removed from Montrose Beach. The eggs stopped developing earlier this month and are no longer viable.
After surviving the Fourth of July weekend, Monty and Rose were incubating four potential chicks in their second clutch of eggs by the volleyball courts before the first one hatched. The freshly hatched chicks typically stick around the nest. The plovers should be ready to fly about a month after hatching.
The threat of predators — both human and animal — remains. The plover chicks can run about as soon as they have hatched, said Clemency, so “they’re very mobile but they’re also fragile and vulnerable.”
But for now, the birders are celebrating the first “little poof balls” Chicago has seen in a long time.
“I think everyone feels the collective excitement,” Giometti said. “That this is a feather in the cap that Chicago can brag about.”
mgreene@chicagotribune.com
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