Contributor
Date
Location
- Age and sex
- Juvenile, Unknown sex - X
Media notes
This juvenile Buff-breasted Sandpiper was found earlier in the day by Logan Kahle and photographed by Curtis A. Marantz on 10 October 2016 at Harper Dry Lake, San Bernardino County, California.
Observation details
This bird was found earlier in the day by Logan Kahle and seen by many this afternoon as it foraged in the shallow water amid dead stalks at the north end of the site. This bird called several times when it took flight, typically one call per flight, when it gave an odd “churrup” that I am not sure I have ever heard from this species. This was a relatively small shorebird that was a little smaller and slimmer than nearby Killdeer, but I never saw it with another shorebird species. It had a medium-length bill, an upright posture, long wings, and relatively long legs. The bill was slim, straight, and about as long as the head was wide. The forehead was relatively steep and the crown rounded on a head that was unremarkable in size for a sandpiper. The neck was long and relatively slim, which gave the bird overall a relatively unique appearance for a small sandpiper. The body was relatively plump and full-chested, yet the long wings resulted in the bird having a tapered appearance to its rear end. The posture was generally a little more upright than horizontal, but when this bird was alert the posture may have approached diagonal. I noted both that the wingtips extended a short way beyond the tip of the tail, and that the primary projection was almost as long as the entire length of the exposed tertials, but I cannot say much at all about the tail. I thought this bird was longer-legged than most sandpipers of comparable size, yet its overall structure was probably not too different than that of a Pectoral Sandpiper. This was a subtly colored bird despite its having relatively boldly marked upperparts. The crown was relatively dark yet conspicuously mottled or weakly streaked with buff. I am not sure if the forehead was light or dark, in part because the forehead and forcrown appeared to be soiled (maybe with algae?) The lores, supraloral and superciliary regions, and essentially the entire face were a deep buff in color and without any obvious pattern apart maybe from a diffuse region of paler buff around the eye. The throat, breast, belly, sides, and flanks were also a deep buff color, and unmarked, apart from some darker mottling at the sides of the breast. The buff color of the belly and flanks blended seamlessly into white on the undertail coverts. Returning to the upperparts, I am pretty sure the back of the neck had some darker mottling or streaking but the sides of the neck were relatively unmarked. The back and wings were marked throughout with buffy scaling on a darker background. The mantle feathers were quite small, so the scaling was a fine combination of blackish centers and buff edges. The scapulars were larger but they too had narrow, but well-defined, and seemingly complete fringes of buff encircling a dark center that appeared to be dusky but not quite black, and seemingly with a darker shaft-streaks on at least some feathers. The wing coverts likewise had an evenly scaled pattern with the narrow, buff fringes encircling a dark center that was dusky but not black, and with some feathers seemingly having a darker shaft. The greater coverts were larger than the medians so the fringes created a pattern of elongate rectangles and the centers were even more obviously paler than black but with some internal pattern that may have reflected an internal frame that accentuated the pale fringe. The tertials again had dusky centers that contrasted with the edges of buff that extended the length of each feather to create a conspicuously striped pattern. Contrasting with the boldly marked tertials, the exposed primary tips were uniformly black. I never clearly saw the rump or tail when the bird was on the ground, yet I could see clearly in even a brief view that the underwing coverts were strikingly white. The bill appeared to be entirely black, the eyes were sufficiently dark that they essentially appeared to be black, and the legs and feet were a deep yellow in color.
Technical information
- Model
- Canon EOS 7D Mark II
- Lens
- EF100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS II USM
- ISO
- 320
- Focal length
- 400 mm
- Flash
- Flash did not fire, auto
- f-stop
- f/8.0
- Shutter speed
- 1/1000 sec
- Dimensions
- 1897 pixels x 1210 pixels
- Original file size
- 584.01 KB