Piping plovers [USA 2024]

The cute, near-threatened Piping plover (Charadrius melodus) can be seen at beaches of Long Island, NY. Five minutes after arriving on a beach I took a look through my binoculars at a gull that was standing at the shoreline, when I suddenly noticed a smaller bird in between the gull and me. It was quite well camouflaged against the sand. I did not expect to see the Piping plover so quickly. It was moving around without worrying about me, when suddenly (see video at 1:10) it started to make weird movements, as if it was injured. I knew it could show this behavior to lead a potential predator away from its nest, but it was at the water's edge, whereas the nest must be back in the dunes somewhere. So it was odd. It could not have been me, since I was standing in the same spot already for 5 minutes when it started doing this. I could only capture a few moments of it on video unfortunately. There had been an Osprey overhead earlier , but I doubt that it will eat Piping plover chicks. Possibly the plover was simply practicing its "I'm injured" moves?
The last part of the video is recorded on another day on another beach. It was very windy, hence the music: Embrace by Sappheiros

[@WanderingSoleTV]

Aw, super cute!