Dispersal Patterns Suggest Two Breeding Populations of Piping Plovers in Eastern Canada

Abstract Piping Plovers (Charadrius m. melodus) were banded in eastern Canada, in the Gulf of St. Lawrence (Gulf) region, including the Magdalen Islands (Quebec), New Brunswick, Newfoundland, northern Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island, and the southern Nova Scotia (sNS) region from 1998–2003, and recaptured and/or resighted from 1999–2007. Return rates of banded individuals were greater for adults than juvenile birds, likely reflecting the higher survival and site fidelity of this age class. The best-fit model explaining differences in annual dispersal distance included age class (P < 0.001), region (P  =  0.004) and the interaction of age class and region (P  =  0.074). Juvenile dispersal movements in the Gulf (median: 28.0 km, range: 0.4–306.3 km) were greater than in sNS (median: 18.6 km, range: 6.5–74.8 km), but adult movements in sNS (median: 4.0 km, range: 0.01–70.7 km) were greater than in the Gulf (median: 0.5 km, range: 0.01–298.6 km). While some annual dispersal movements in the Gulf were lar...