Miles of pristine coastline draw beachcombers and sunbathers (not to mention piping plovers).

BBC: Historical day trips from Boston

He said New York and Long Island currently have 800, or 10 percent, of the total global population of piping plovers.

WSJ: NY's Fire Island debris effort faces bird deadline

"Piping Plovers are not beloved everywhere, " said Ron Bourque, a former president of New York City Audubon who lives near Jamaica Bay.

WSJ: Wrecked Beaches Could Aid Plovers

When oil was just starting to smudge some of the birds on beaches now thick with it, I saw sanderlings, ruddy turnstones, black-bellied plovers and other such northbound birds.

CNN: We are all Gulf victims now

Some of the longest-distance migrants on Earth are various sandpipers, plovers and other shorebirds, many of which winter as far south as Patagonia and breed as far north as the high arctic.

CNN: We are all Gulf victims now