#sandpiper

VERILY MY LIEGE!!!

Least Sandpiper (Calidris minutilla) LEUCISTIC, family Scolopacidae, order Charadriiformes, CA, USA

photographs by Mary Beth Cantrell

L - Red-necked Stint (Calidris ruficollis) and

R - Spoon-billed Sandpiper (Calidris pygmaea), family Scolopacidae, order Charadriiformes, Coast of WB, India

photograph by Santanab Majumder

Spoon-billed Sandpiper (Calidris pygmaea), T- winter plumage, B - breeding plumage, family Scolopacidae, order Charadriiformes

Breeds on the coast of the Bering Sea.

Winters in SE Asia.

photographs by tareq’s photography & Jan van de Kam

Upland Sandpiper (Bartramia longicauda), family Scolopacidae, order Charadriiformes

Nests on the northern prairies and tundra of North America.

Overwinters on grassland in South America.

Not usually found on beaches or shoreline, like most other sandpipers.

This is one of my nemesis birds! I’ve never gotten a great look at this bird, so this is the year I make a concerted effort to finally get one!!!

photographs: Johnath & Sean Evans

Spotted Sandpiper (Actitis macularius), family Scolopacidae, order Chradriiformes, KY, USA

photograph by Mike Blevins

Buff-breasted Sandpiper (Calidris subruficollis), HE STRUTT!!!, family Scolopacidae, order Charadriiformes, North Slope of Alaska

photograph by Stephen Dunaway

Stilt Sandpiper (Calidris himantopus), family Scolopacidae, order Charadriiformes, TX Coast, USA

photograph by James Corgill

Tuamotu Sandpiper aka Kivi-Kivi (Prosobonia parvirostris), family Scolopacidae, order Charadriiformes, endemic to the Tuamotu Islands in the South Pacific

ENDANGERED.

While this sandpiper feeds along shorelines, like other shorebirds, it is also found in thickets and scrubland.

Endangered due to habitat destruction and the intorduction of rats to their islands. (Rat eradication on some islands has greatly benefited the birds).

Least Sandpiper (Calidris minutilla). Family Scolopacidae, order Charadriiformes.

Today is mi birthday!! Why not celebrate by sharing one of my fave birds, the Least Sandpiper!!

Spotted Sandpipers

Sandpiper

The roaring alongside he takes for granted,

and that every so often the world is bound to shake.

He runs, he runs to the south, finical, awkward,

in a state of controlled panic, a student of Blake.

The beach hisses like fat. On his left, a sheet

of interrupting water comes and goes

and glazes over his dark and brittle feet.

He runs, he runs straight through it, watching his toes.

--Watching, rather, the spaces of sand between them

where (no detail too small) the Atlantic drains

rapidly backwards and downwards. As he runs,

he stares at the dragging grains.

The world is a mist. And then the world is

minute and vast and clear. The tide

is higher or lower. He couldn't tell you which.

His beak is focussed; he is preoccupied,

looking for something, something, something.

Poor bird, he is obsessed!

The millions of grains are black, white, tan, and gray

mixed with quartz grains, rose and amethyst.

Willet (Tringa semipalmata). Family Scolopacidae, order Charadriiformes.

Sanderling (Calidris alba). Family Scolopacidae, order Charadriiformes.

Lesser Yellowlegs (Tringa flavipes). Family Scolopacidae, order Charadriiformes.

Wilson's Phalarope (Phalaropus tricolor) female. Family Scolopacidae, order Charadriiformes.

The colorful ones are the females, and the pale ones are the males.