Stilt Sandpiper
Calidris himantopus
Medium-sized sandpiper with long legs and bill. Shaped like a tall, stretched-out Dunlin. Breeding plumage is striking with extensive messy black-and-white barring, white eyebrow, and orange cheek. Nonbreeding is plain pale gray with contrasting white eyebrow. Juveniles usually show pale buffy tones on the head and neck and have an attractive scaly pattern on the upperparts. At all ages, note long, slightly droopy bill and dull yellowish-green legs. In flight, look for pale tail and white rump. Breeds on Arctic tundra in Canada and Alaska. Common migrant through central North America; uncommon to rare on both coasts. During migration and winter, found in shallow wetlands, including marshes, flooded fields, and muddy ponds. Usually wades in the water while feeding, often mixed with yellowlegs and dowitchers.
Identification
This species resembles the curlew sandpiper in its curved bill, long neck, pale supercilium and white rump. It is readily distinguished from that species by its much longer and paler legs, which give rise to its common and scientific names. It also lacks an obvious wing bar in flight. Breeding adults are distinctive, heavily barred beneath, and with reddish patches above and below the supercilium. The back is brown with darker feather centres. Winter plumage is basically gray above and white below.Juvenile stilt sandpipers resemble the adults in their strong head pattern and brownish back, but they are not barred below, and show white fringes on the back feathering.<p>Measurements:
Taxonomy
This sandpiper bears some resemblance to the smaller calidrid sandpipers or "stints". DNA sequence information is incapable of determining whether it should be placed in Calidris or in the monotypic genus Micropalama. It appears most closely allied with the curlew sandpiper, which is another aberrant species only tentatively placed in Calidris and could conceivably be separated with it in Erolia.
- Scientific name
- Calidris himantopus
- Authority
- (Bonaparte, 1826)
- Order
- Charadriiformes
- Family
- Scolopacidae
- Genus
- Calidris
Range and habitat
Breeding range: NA : high and low Arctic tundra to taiga edge of n Nearctic: North Slope of Alaska and n Canada to s Victoria I. (nc Canada); also locally w coasts of Hudson and James bays. Non-breeding range: coastal and inland Mexico and throughout the West Indies; in Central America mainly along Pacific coast; coastal South America to Peru and n Brazil, and in pampas of nc Argentina.
- Breeding range
- NA : high and low Arctic tundra to taiga edge of n Nearctic: North Slope of Alaska and n Canada to s Victoria I. (nc Canada); also locally w coasts of Hudson and James bays
- Non-breeding range
- coastal and inland Mexico and throughout the West Indies; in Central America mainly along Pacific coast; coastal South America to Peru and n Brazil, and in pampas of nc Argentina
- Migration
- Complete migrants
Behavior
Migration pattern: Complete migrants.
Conservation
Population trend: rising.
- Population trend
- rising
Photos
Distribution
Bird Calls
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