First Look: Jimin & Maya’s Babies Running Around Like It’s Nothing

From the Urban Dictionary:

Running around like it’s nothing.

The phrase “running around like it’s nothing” is informal slang used by people working with endangered Piping Plovers. The phrase first originated in the NestStory (TM) software system. “Running around like it’s nothing” is usually used as a humblebrag to imply that Piping Plover chicks are either older or more potent than their data suggest.

Here is a first look at Jimin and Maya’s freshly hatched chicks; not just the first chicks hatched in Barnegat Light this season, but the first in the whole world.

While Jimin & Maya got a good jump on the Memorial Day chaos with their triumphantly early hatch, the tradeoff is the cold. Their first evening on the beach was unseasonably cold and windy. This is a pickle for Piping Plover babies as they have to both feed themselves and take breaks to warm up under mom and dad’s wings. These chicks won’t be able to regulate their body temperature for several days. So they charge up like batteries under their parents’ wings, then run out to eat as many bugs as possible before they lose too much heat to continue. Recharge. Repeat.

It was a difficult night to film them as they hid deep in the grasses of Barnegat Light’s dune in the cold wind. But this is their life. It’s all they do. So you can see how every tiny disturbance to them cuts into their food and gas bill, sometimes to the extent they can’t even survive.

Enjoy this peek at the hidden life of the beach. It’s incredible to consider that tens of thousands of people will be walking right through here in just a few weeks. Unfortunately, almost none of them will ever see these beauties. But Jimin & Maya will see everything. Most scenes where Maya or Jimin abandon and dump their cold babies on the beach are reactions to someone walking their dog, casually and illegally, on the beach.

It’s a good reminder that “my dog won’t bother the birds” doesn’t mean what people think it means. Canines are bothering birds people don’t see or even know to exist or believe in. (And while we’re lecturing, the only worse excuse is, “I live here.” Laws prohibiting dogs on the beach during the summer are local laws put into place and sustained by the people who live here and the local government officials they elect.) So do what you can to give local animals a break. Hopefully this video will inspire some compassion and a recognition that the beach isn’t a sandbox; it’s a home.

Since these babies must start running on their awkward toothpick legs and catching bugs and worms almost as soon as they’re born, I hoped to see glimpses of them comically stumbling, tripping, and tumbling down the dune on their first night on earth.

But not Jimin & Maya’s babies. These babies are running around like it’s nothing. They might have hatched even earlier than we think!