Purple Sandpiper
Calidris maritima
Plump, rock-loving shorebird with slightly droopy bill. Most often seen in nonbreeding plumage, which is fairly dark gray with spotted underparts. Namesake purple sheen (mostly on back, scapulars, and tertials) only visible at close distance in good light. Legs and base of bill usually bright orange. Messy-looking breeding plumage is darker and more heavily marked, with limited rusty tones on upperparts. Largely inaccessible breeding range on high Arctic tundra; most often seen in northern Europe, Spitsbergen, and Iceland. Winters at slightly lower latitudes, regularly south to the mid-Atlantic region in North America and the Iberian Peninsula in Europe; found in flocks on rocky coastlines and jetties pounded by heavy surf.
Identification
Adults have short yellow legs and a medium thin dark bill with a yellow base. The body is dark on top with a slight purplish gloss and mainly white underneath. The breast is smeared with grey and the rump is black. They measure 20–22 cm (7.9–8.7 in) in length and 42–46 cm (17–18 in) across the wings, and weight is from 50–105 g (1.8–3.7 oz).
Taxonomy
The purple sandpiper was formally described in 1764 by the Danish zoologist Morten Thrane Brünnich and given the binomial name Tringa maratina. This species was formerly placed in the genus Erolia, but is now placed with 23 other sandpipers in the genus Calidris that was introduced in 1804 by the German naturalist Blasius Merrem. The genus name is from Ancient Greek kalidris or skalidris, a term used by Aristotle for some grey-coloured waterside birds. The specific epithet maritima is from Latin and means "of the sea", from mare, "sea". The purple sandpiper is treated as monotypic: no subspecies are recognised. Within the genus Calidris the purple sandpiper is sister to the rock sandpiper (Calidris ptilocnemis) and is closely related to the sanderling (Calidris alba) and the dunlin (Calidris alpina).
- Scientific name
- Calidris maritima
- Authority
- (Brünnich, 1764)
- Order
- Charadriiformes
- Family
- Scolopacidae
- Genus
- Calidris
Range and habitat
The purple sandpiper's breeding range extends from the arctic islands of northern Canada, eastwards to Greenland, Iceland, Svalbard and northern Scandinavia across to Western Siberia and the Taymyr Peninsula. In the high arctic the sandpiper breeds at low altitude on the tundra, sometimes far from the coastline, but in the subarctic regions of Sweden and Norway it breeds on barren mountain sides near the limit of the frozen ground. Birds breeding at high latitudes migrate south and spend the winter on rocky shores on both sides of the north Atlantic. They winter along the North America coast as far south as South Carolina and on the eastern Atlantic coast as far south as France and northern Iberia.<p>Birds wintering in northern Scotland and southwest Ireland migrate to Canada (Baffin Island and Devon Island) to breed.<p>In Britain, these birds occur in winter in good numbers principally along the east and south coasts, where they favour rocky shorelines adjacent to the sea. It is much rarer as a breeding bird, found only in a localised area of the Cairngorms National Park, where 1–3 pairs have bred since 1978. Records of breeding by this species in the UK are monitored and archived by the Rare Breeding Birds Panel.<p>They are late migrants and move to rocky, ice-free Atlantic coasts in winter. Most go no further south than North Carolina and northern Portugal. They are fairly gregarious, forming small flocks, often with ruddy turnstones. This species is tame and approachable.
- Breeding range
- NA, PAL : high to low montane Arctic of North Atlantic and Arctic oceans: Greenland (except n, ne), Iceland, Jan Mayen (ne of Iceland), Bear I. and Svalbard (n of Norway), Scandinavia to far nw Russia, Franz Josef Land and Novaya Zemlya (n of nw Siberia) and Severnaya Zemlya and Taymyr Pen. (nc Siberia); Banks to s Ellesmere and Baffin is. (nc Canada)
- Non-breeding range
- e NA, w Europe : rocky North Atlantic coasts: Iceland, Faroe Is., British Is., Scandinavia and w Europe (e North Atlantic); Labrador and Gulf of St. Lawrence (se Canada) to North Carolina (w North Atlantic)
- Migration
- Complete migrants
Behavior
Migration pattern: Complete migrants.
Conservation
Population trend: declining.
- Population trend
- declining
Photos
Distribution
Bird Calls
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