Tag Archives: shorebirds

Hi-Line Report: Bad Weather Can Bring Good Birds

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Most serious Montana birders try to make it up to the Hi-Line every year. If you’ve never heard of the Hi-Line, it is the northern region of the state that basically follows Highway 2 from East Glacier National Park all the way to the North Dakota Border. It’s an area full of rolling hills, badlands, farms and ranches—and a whole lotta birds. For Braden and me, the region is best represented by the Bowdoin National Wildlife Refuge, a sprawling 15,551-acre refuge near Malta that encompasses a rich variety of wet and dry habitats. We don’t make it up to Bowdoin every year, but this year I was fortunate enough to get invited to visit a school in nearby Chinook. Even better, I timed the visit for spring migration and breeding. I booked an Airbnb in Malta and drove up two days early to give me a full day at Bowdoin. The bad news? The forecast called for rain.

Indeed, when I arrived at the refuge at 6:00 a.m., rain pelted the car, propelled by a cold wind. Geez, I thought. I’m not going to see anything today. It was so cold and wet that I skipped my usual stop at the visitor center and instead headed straight out onto the first, five-mile section of the fifteen-mile loop around the lake. I noted that water levels, although not great, were better than I’d seen them two years before, but the first five-mile section was a time to focus not on water birds, but on denizens of the grass. Normally, in fact, Braden and I spend the most time in this section, stopping frequently to listen for Grasshopper Sparrows, Baird’s Sparrows, Chestnut-collared Longspurs, and other grassland favorites (see our post “Great Grassland Birding”). Today, that proved impossible. Every time I opened the window, wind and rain cascaded in and made it almost impossible to hear calls beyond the heavy-metal songs of Western Meadowlarks.

Steady rain and wind limited my ability to find grassland birds!

Mercifully, a few species took pity on me. Right off the bat, I espied one of our favorite birds, a Bobolink—the only one I would see the entire trip. Then, I spotted a drenched Grasshopper Sparrow perched on a small bush—the lone GRSP I would see that day. Lark Buntings also put in an appearance, along with Horned Larks and Savannah Sparrows. I also was pleased to see shorebirds, but on this section of the drive, they were far away. At one point, I leaped out to set up the scope I was testing out (see our next post), but immediately got drenched and was unable to ID much except for Wilson’s Phalaropes, American Avocets, and a Willet.

Lark Buntings were the most cooperative grassland birds I managed to see on this cold, wet, windy day. Thank you, Lark Buntings!

As I kept driving, however, conditions steadily improved and I got better looks at shorebirds. The phalaropes were especially impressive and I estimated at least a thousand out on the water and working the shore. The vast majority were Wilson’s, but with patience, I found a group of four Red-necked Phalaropes—most clearly identified by their smaller size, overall darker appearance, and distinct light lines running down their dark backs. Ducks were not super abundant, but plentiful and I counted at least ten species, including my first-of-the-year Canvasbacks!

Twice, I drove down to some boat ramps and, despite the rain, nabbed a good “harvest” of shorebirds. I found about half a dozen Semipalmated Sandpipers and one Western Sandpiper. The real surprises, which I confirmed later with Braden’s help, were a Baird’s Sandpiper and a White-rumped Sandpiper! The latter was especially difficult to figure out because it didn’t readily show the diagnostic, thin lines of spots extending from the neck down to below the wings, but the overall appearance and body size fit. I was thrilled to find these birds as we’d never found them at Bowdoin before. Then again, we’d never birded Bowdoin this early in the season, so they were all part of my continuing Montana birding education.

Both this Baird’s (left) and several Semipalmated Sandpipers (right) proved early season surprises on this cold, rainy Bowdoin day. The larger size, long wing tips extending beyond the tail, and “medallion” appearance on the wings help distinguish Baird’s from the smaller peeps.

As I was leaving the second boat ramp, I noticed a Marbled Godwit in the parking area. Godwits, like Willets and Long-billed Curlews, are shorebirds and grassland birds. They nest in grasslands, usually near water, so seeing one here didn’t surprise me. I was about to drive off when the godwit suddenly launched itself. As I watched, it flew a hundred yards or so to the shore—and landed next to two birds I had especially hoped to see: Black-bellied Plovers! Loyal FSB readers will note that I’ve written about these fine birds a lot in the past couple of years (see, for instance, this post), and so it was with special pleasure I observed them now—and in their best black-bellied breeding plumage. Thank you, Mr. Godwit, for pointing them out!

This helpful Marbled Godwit (right) made a special effort to point out two Black-bellied Plovers that I had so woefully overlooked!

By the time I made it back to the visitor center, my stomach rumbled and, though the rain had slackened, the cold and wind remained. I debated whether I should even get out of the car to explore around the small pond there, but I knew that Braden would never forgive me if I didn’t. Marshaling my determination, I walked over to the start of the little path that circumscribes the pond. Almost immediately, a curious face popped up from behind a bush thirty feet away. “Whoa!” I whispered. At first, I thought it was a weasel, but it was much larger than the three or four weasels I’d observed in the past. Stoat? Ferret? I asked myself. Could it possibly be a mink? I’d never seen a mink and didn’t know if they even lived in Montana, but it seemed to fit the profile. Later, iNaturalist experts helped me confirm that that’s what it was. After looking at me for several moments, the long, bizarre-looking creature loped across the road and disappeared into the brush. The birds, however, were not to be outdone by a mere mammal!

Seeing my lifer American Mink was about the last thing on my mind as I braved Bowdoin’s visitor center area for one last birding effort!

As I began poking around the beginning of the trail, I saw shapes flitting about in the bushes. A brownish bird streaked by me giving off Swainson’s Thrush vibes, but I didn’t see it well enough to definitely identify it. Minutes later, a reddish-backed bird landed on a nearby branch below me—a Veery! Then I got a good look at another Swainson’s Thrush, this time confirming the ID. In the branches above it, an adorable little Least Flycatcher watched me, but none of these would be the stars of the show.

Empidonax flycatchers are notoriously difficult to identify by sight, but this bird’s “cute” appearance—and the fact that no other empids should have been anywhere in the area—helped clinch the ID.

Even through the wind, I could hear both Yellow Warblers and Common Yellowthroats around me, even if I couldn’t get clear looks at any of them. Then, a small songbird landed in a tree about thirty feet away. I got my binoculars up in time to recognize a species I had longed to see—a Blackpoll Warbler! Like the Swainson’s and Veery, the warbler was clearly in migration, on its way to northern breeding grounds in Canada and Alaska. Braden and I had found them three times before in Montana, but always females. Not only did a gorgeous, breeding plumage male now stare back at me, it was the first Blackpoll I had ever found on my own!

As you can tell, the day proved tough for photography all-around, but I managed to get fuzzy ID photos of my Bird of the Trip, Blackpoll Warbler!

You won’t be surprised to hear that the Blackpoll Warbler immediately secured Bird of the Trip honors. Even more, it cemented the notion that just because conditions are bad for birders, they can still be great for birds. In fact, storms often cause birds to hunker in place for a day or two—perhaps the reason I found some of the especially cool birds I found today. I plan to remind myself of that the next time I’m debating whether to venture out into the pelting wind and rain.

Chasing Morelet’s Seedeaters—or Why You Shouldn’t Depend on Map Apps Near the Mexican Border (Texas 2025, Final Installment)

My success finding Black-capped Vireos and Golden-cheeked Warblers (see our last post) left me a welcome gift: an extra day to pursue another bird that keenly interested me. It was a bird Braden and I had unsuccessfully tried for on our 2018 trip to the Lower Rio Grande Valley: Morelet’s Seedeater. Though not rare in its core year-round range of Central America and eastern Mexico, this adorable “finchy” songbird just barely creeps over into the US along the Rio Grande Valley.

Catching sights such as this setting moon is one of the benefits of being an “early birder.”

Sunday morning, I rose at four a.m. and headed south from Uvalde. As they had on the previous morning, both a spectacular sunrise and unforgettable setting full moon rewarded me. As light crept over this flat country, caracaras flew along the road and Scissor-tailed Flycatchers perched on telephone wires. I even got a glimpse of a flock of quail leaping over a fence. Scaled Quail? I could only guess! After ninety minutes, my little highway joined Interstate 35.

And that’s where the trouble began.

I-35 is a main artery for trade between Mexico, the US, and Canada. As I sped south, I kept seeing signs for Mexico, but my map app directions assured me that I should keep going and turn off at an exit called Riverbank Drive. As I kept driving, however, I saw no signs for that—or any other—exit, and I realized that the only other traffic around me consisted of huge 18-wheelers. Finally, a thought occurred to me: Uh-oh.

Soon I found myself at a dead stop, surrounded by big rigs, with no way to turn around. There are moments in life where you know you are in a fix, and there’s not a thing you can do about it. This was one of those. Still, hope springs eternal and I climbed out of the car and walked to a big rig next to me. The kind Mexican driver, undoubtedly flummoxed by what I was doing there, rolled down his window, and we had the following conversation:

Me: Uh, I think I made a mistake. I’m trying to go to Laredo.

Driver: Laredo, Mexico?

Me: Uh, no. Laredo, Texas.

Driver (looking worried for me): You’ll have to turn around.

Me: Where?
Driver (after conferring with his partner): I don’t know.

These Big Rigs kept me company as I contemplated life as a Mexican citizen.

It was then that I began pondering the frightening ramifications of entering Mexico without a passport. I mean, could I have picked a worse time in history for this to happen??? The only good thing was that a Scissor-tailed Flycatcher perched nearby, blissfully unconcerned by my human drama. A few minutes later, the border opened and I eased in front of my new trucker friend. For ten minutes I and the big rigs inched forward until we reached a wide No Man’s Land of pavement and there I spotted an actual border worker. I pulled up next to him and explained my mistake. Looking vaguely amused and overly patient, he said, “See my buddy back there? Turn around and he’ll keep the trucks stopped while you exit at that road on the side.” I proceeded as instructed, gratefully waving to the “buddy.” I could have burst into tears at this point, but instead, I laughed all the way to the next exit—the real exit—which led to my original destination, Father McNaboe Park.

The Rio Grande River, aka the Mexican Border, complete with Border Patrol agents and lots of Carrizo cane, where Morelet’s Seedeaters like to hang out.

By the time I reached the park, I had experienced a week’s worth of drama, but remember, I still had some serious birding on the agenda. In 2018, Braden and I had visited the Lower Rio Grande Valley (LRGV) and even spent a night in Laredo, but had somehow failed to find McNaboe Park. I don’t know how, as the park consisted of a wide, long swath of trails, playing fields, and other amenities right on the Rio Grande River. Today, the park was jammed with people and I felt at ease as I walked toward the river. Before I even got there, I spotted my first great birds of the day—a pair of Hooded Orioles, a species I hadn’t seen since visiting Southern California seven years before. Not long afterward, I saw another oriole, a Bullock’s Oriole—perhaps on its way to Montana?

Over the phone the night before, Braden had told me to look for the Morelet’s Seedeaters in the “cane grass,” a tall invasive species known in Texas as Carrizo cane. Apparently, this plant can be found all along the 1,255-mile reach of the Rio Grande, and it didn’t take me long to find thick stands of it. I began walking along them looking for little black and brown birds. I covered a couple of hundred yards without seeing any and then walked down to a little sandbar right at river level. No seedeaters.

Then, I happened to glance up a side channel at another thick stand of cane. There, perched on one of the stalks was an erect little bird with a finchy bill. I didn’t get my binoculars up in time to get a good look, but I immediately knew: I had found my bird!

I was just about to get a great photo of this Morelet’s Seedeater when a loud car rumbled up next to me. I accidentally managed this flight shot, though, which is kind of fun.

Of course, that didn’t keep me from wanting better looks, and for the next hour or so, I walked various paths and channels. I got to know the bird’s song and it wasn’t long before I was hearing and seeing more of these cute little guys. They were pretty shy, but I managed good looks—and saw some other great birds as well. These included a pair of Black-necked Stilts, a Spotted Sandpiper, a Green Heron, and even a lone Mexican Duck in the middle of the river. Not including the seedeaters, the show stoppers, as usual, were a pair of Vermillion Flycatchers.

Do Vermillion Flycatchers get way more attention than they deserve? Probably. Does anyone ever get tired of looking at them? I doubt it!

After a late breakfast at the French restaurant McDaniels, I decided to hit one more park in Laredo—North Central Park. Remarkably, I had failed to find a Golden-fronted Woodpecker so far on the trip, and though the heat was comin’ on fast, the park had abundant sightings of them. It took only five minutes to hear and then see one of these handsome birds and, walking a couple of miles or so, I also added Great Kiskadees and Bell’s Vireo to my trip list. Then, before I inadvertently wandered toward Mexico again, I turned tail and headed back up I-35 for San Antonio.

Link to my Texas Trip Report: https://ebird.org/tripreport/351263

Total Number of Species for the Trip: 144

My Top 6 Trip Birds:

Least Bittern (see post “Anahuac Lifer Attack”)

Yellow-throated Warbler (see Texas Hill Country post)

Black-capped Vireo (see Texas Hill Country post)

Golden-cheeked Warbler (see Texas Hill Country post)

Morelet’s Seedeater (this post)

Yellow-throated Vireo (see Peveto Woods post)

A pair of Black-necked Stilts flying downstream over the Rio Grande.

Anahuac Lifer Attack (Texas 2025 Part 2)

After my morning exploring Peveto Woods (see last post), I had intended to visit another favorite coastal Texas location, Sabine Woods (see “Going Cuckoo for Fall Warblers in Texas”). Alas, my long previous travel day caught up with me so I decided to grab a siesta back at my hotel in Winnie. Besides, it didn’t look like the warblers and other migrants were showing up in large numbers, and I reasoned that I wasn’t likely to see much more at Sabine Woods than I’d seen at Peveto that morning. Instead, that afternoon I decided to visit another Texas favorite of Braden’s and mine: Anahuac National Wildlife Refuge.

Braden during our first visit to Anahuac NWR in 2016.

The refuge lies about halfway between Winnie and High Island, and Braden and I had many fond memories of it. During our Big Year in 2016, we’d seen our first Scissor-tailed Flycatcher here, along with our first Common Yellowthroat. I especially liked driving a route called the Shoveler Pond Loop. This afternoon, I didn’t expect any major surprises, but it was a pleasant way to watch Roseate Spoonbills, Common Gallinules, and a variety of other water birds. As I approached the refuge entrance, however, I got my first major surprise: the refuge had a new name! Only in the past few weeks, Anahuac had been renamed the Jocelyn Nungaray NWR. I later looked up how the name change had come about. I like to keep this blog politics-free, but I will just say that the new name resulted from both a tragic story and crass political shenanigans that apparently caught everyone off-guard. Feel free to look it up yourself and draw your own conclusions.

The good news? Shoveler Pond Loop looked better than I’d ever seen it! The loop consists of a 2.5-mile road that circumnavigates a 300-acre wetlands, and the last time I’d visited, in 2021, the latter seemed clogged with vegetation. Not so today. A large area at the loop’s beginning had been cleared out to create wonderful habitat for wading and dabbling birds and as I proceeded, I noticed many other revived sections as well. In preparation to write this post, I called the refuge to make sure that I wasn’t imagining things, and Park Ranger Chris Campbell confirmed that a couple of years ago, they had drained the wetlands and taken steps to remove large areas of cane grass.

Shoveler Pond Loop is definitely one of my Top 5 “car birding” routes in the United States.

The results looked terrific. As I began making my way around the loop, I immediately noticed large numbers of Black-necked Stilts and dowitchers—probably Long-billed, according to Campbell. Both Greater and Lesser Yellowlegs made a good show of it, too, and it wasn’t long before I began obsessing over some smaller shorbs. I eventually IDed two of these as Dunlins, and was especially pleased to find a Least Sandpiper as well. Alligators also seemed to relish the new-and-improved loop, and I watched with amusement as Black-necked Stilts nonchalantly probed the shallows only a few feet from the six- or eight-foot crocodilians.

Uh, Mr. Black-necked Stilt, have you looked over your shoulder lately?

I soon found a great collection of waders including Roseate Spoonbills, Tricolored Herons, Snowy Egrets, and both White and White-faced Ibises. It was when I turned the first corner, however, that the real excitement began.

“Uh, just where do you think you’re landing, Mr. Tricolored Heron? Us Neotropic Cormorants and the herps over there were here first.”

First up? A kind of duck neither Braden nor I had ever seen before: Fulvous Whistling Ducks! “Wow! Lifer!” I exclaimed out loud. For some reason, it never occurred to me that I would see these ducks, but there they were—sitting only fifty feet from their compadres, Black-bellied Whistling Ducks! And the hits were just getting started.

As I rounded the second corner, a narrow canal paralleled the road to my left, and suddenly, a medium-sized, reddish-brown bird flew out from beneath the road to some reeds across the canal. Astonishingly, it was another lifer, one that I recognized immediately: a Least Bittern! One of the smallest members of the heron family, Least Bitterns apparently are not all that rare. Ranger Campbell told me that they are very common year-round at the refuge, but the thing is, they are incredibly shy. I will just tell you that I never really expected to see one, and yet here one was! Not only that, it struck a pleasing pose while I kept my camera shutter clicking.

Seeing my lifer Least Bittern not only justified the entire trip, it captured Bird of the Trip honors!

I had barely started again when I noticed a couple of terns flying around. Generally while I am birding, I ignore terns and gulls until I’ve identified everything else. As one of the terns zoomed by my car, however, I noticed that it had an oddly blunt thick black bill. “No way,” I said, rushing to take some ID photos. My hunch was correct. These were Gull-billed Terns—lifer Gull-billed Terns!

Terns favor the prepared mind. If I hadn’t been birding for more than a decade, the black bill on this guy may never have caught my attention.

Really, I could hardly believe it. I arrived at Anahuac expecting to see birds that I had seen many times before. Now, within the space of ten minutes, I added three new species to my life list! It seemed so preposterous that I laughed out loud. What’s more, this was still only my first day of birding on my Texas trip. One thing was for sure: I never would have had such success if it weren’t for the hard-working government employees we all depend on. It just shows the wisdom of investing in protecting our natural resources for the common good.

Peveto Woods, Louisiana: Spring Migration Hotspot

FatherSonBirding is a labor of love for both Braden and me, and our goal is to entertain and educate, and to promote bird conservation. If you’d like to support our work, please consider buying one or more of Sneed’s books and make a donation to one of the bird-related groups mentioned below. Thank you!

There’s a good reason the blog has been quiet the past couple of weeks. Braden is finishing up his honor’s project before graduating (gasp!) from the University of Maine while I jumped on a chance to head to Texas for the sixth time since Braden and I began birding. The trip arose from an invitation to talk about my book Birding for Boomers at the Mountains and Plains Independent Booksellers Association spring conference in San Antonio. Happily, the event took place during spring migration, so I of course booked three extra nights before and three extra nights after the conference to see some birds!

As soon as I picked up my rental car in San Antonio, I high-tailed it the four hours to Winnie, Texas on the coast just east of Houston. Why Winnie? Because it provides great access to several well-known stopover places for migrating songbirds and offers a chance to soak up a variety of coastal and aquatic species as well. For this trip, though, I was determined to explore some new birding areas, and my first morning I got up before dawn and headed to my first destination, Peveto Woods Sanctuary, just across the border in Louisiana.

A bonus to driving to Peveto Woods is that once you cross the bridge into Louisiana at Sabine Pass, you can find a wonderful little shorebird area, especially if it happens to be low tide. And by the way, I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of posting Black-necked Stilts. So sue me already!
Peveto Woods offers delightful paths through trees, any one of which could be hiding a migrating songbird!

Peveto Woods is owned and operated by the Baton Rouge Audubon Society and like Sabine Woods run by the Texas Ornithological Society and the more famous High Island sanctuaries operated by Houston Audubon, Peveto consists of a patch of forest right along the shore. As soon as I pulled up, I knew I was going to like it. Trails headed off in all directions, crisscrossing forty acres of mostly oak-dominated woodlands. I saw two friendly-looking guys, Scott Delaney and Paul Wallace, who looked like they knew their way around and asked the best way to explore. It turns out, they had been volunteering their time here for many years and suggested I make my way to the east fence line and work my way back. They also explained that the land where the woods sat was called a chenier, a place where wave actions had piled sand and shells up higher than the surrounding area, allowing trees to grow. Hurricanes still occasionally obliterated the place, but the vegetation recovered quickly.

Hey, I’m gettin’ pretty good at these selfies–this one with my new birding friends, Paul (center) and Scott.

Unfortunately, I quickly learned that the main birds I had hoped to see—warblers—had not yet arrived in significant numbers. I was about a week early for many species and, for now, northerly winds had kept others grounded in the Yucatan. Only one hundred yards down the trail, however, I encountered a nice little mixed flock of other species. Sound ID picked up a White-eyed Vireo, and I quickly saw a Warbling Vireo along with at least four Red-eyed Vireos. Joining them were several Orchard Orioles, a couple of Yellow-rumped Warblers, and an Orange-crowned Warbler. Most were flitting about high in the trees, making photography difficult, but my heart warmed at seeing them.

Although the more exotic warblers had yet to reach the Gulf coast, this (Myrtle) Yellow-rumped Warbler tried to hold down the fort till they arrived!

One awesome thing about Peveto is that you can walk right out to the beach and here I saw the trip’s first Black-bellied Plover, along with a couple of Royal Terns and Willets.

For those aware of my love of Black-bellied Plovers, you can imagine how delighted I was to find the first one of the trip on my very first outing.

Returning to the woods, I kept strolling, finding migrating Gray Catbirds and pre-migration White-crowned Sparrows. A couple of Anhingas flew over, and then Sound ID picked up what would be the star of my visit: a Yellow-throated Vireo.

I just fell in love with this Yellow-throated Vireo. In fact, YTVIs are one of my new favorite birds, and I would see or hear them twice more on the trip.

I had seen YTVIs before, but so early in my birding career that they had gotten lost in the steepness of my learning curve. Now, a bird in glorious yellow, white, and gray plumage perched right above me. I shot some quick photos, and then just stood and admired this incredible creature. Like most other vireo species, this one had migrated from Central or South America, completing the eighteen-hour or so flight directly across the Gulf of Mexico.

It seemed like years since I’d seen Indigo Buntings—and then, only females or juveniles. That made it all the more sweet to find these two “Sharp-dressed Men.”

It did make me wonder, though, why the vireos had made it “on time” but most of the warblers had not. “Are vireos stronger fliers?” I wondered. Or had they just timed things better? Either way, I was delighted to see them and get to know them better. And that’s birding for you. Even if the birds don’t always meet your own timetable, they always present a fascinating learning opportunity or two—or, as today, a chance to embrace and enjoy a new group of birds. I rounded off my morning by finding a couple of gorgeous Indigo Buntings on the brushier end of the preserve. I exchanged email addresses with my new friends Scott and Paul, and invited them to look me up when they came to Montana. I suspected, though, that I might make it back to Peveto Woods long before they got to Montana!

My checklist: https://ebird.org/checklist/S223902911

Note: As I post this, the warblers are definitely arriving at Peveto Woods. If you live nearby, what are you waiting for?

The Shorebirds of North America (Book Review)

With spring shorebird migration coming on, we take a break from our Colombian birding series to review a new book that will help prepare you for the exciting, sometimes daunting task of identifying and enjoying some of the world’s most spectacular long-distance migrants. Bird—and read—on!

Legions of FatherSonBirding readers have probably noticed that Braden and I have increasingly become interested—nay, obsessed—by shorebirds over the years. See, for example, our posts

Montana Shorebird Surprise

Abbotts Lagoon, Point Reyes National Seashore (or Chasing Migrants, Part II)

Our fascination may seem odd given that Montana is hardly the world’s epicenter of shorebird activity. Then again, their very rarity here renders them all the more alluring to find and learn about. A natural birding progression also is at work. When beginning one’s birding journey, we birders naturally focus on common, familiar species. As confidence, curiosity, and ambition grow, so does the desire to learn about and identify more difficult groups of birds. When we first began birding, Braden and I focused on woodpeckers, thrushes, waterfowl, waders, owls, and other easier-to-identify species. Over the years, we have plunged into increasingly challenging groups including warblers, sparrows, flycatchers (Braden), gulls, and perhaps more than anything, “shorbs.”

A flock of Western Sandpipers at Point Reyes during my September visit to California with Scott Callow.

When out scanning beaches or shallow lakes, the most common phrase Braden repeats to me is “Shorebirds are tough.” This usually happens when I am whining about the difficulty in distinguishing between off-season Least and Semipalmated Sandpipers, or White-rumped and Baird’s Sandpipers—especially at a distance. But many shorbs are relatively easy to identify, and over the years both Braden and I have come to appreciate—nay, savor—the entire breadth of these fascinating, superbly adapted critters. Imagine my joy, then, when a brand new, beautifully photographed book about shorebirds arrived on my doorstep: Pete Dunne’s and Kevin T. Karlson’s The Shorebirds of North America: A Natural History and Photographic Celebration (Princeton University Press, 2024).

The Shorebirds of North America by Pete Dunne and Kevin T. Karlson (Princeton University Press, 2024)

To say that The Shorebirds of North America is ambitious would be like calling the 18,000-mile round-trip migration of a Red Knot “neat” instead of “epic” or “mind-blowing.” This terrific addition to birding literature not only gives a wonderful overview of the lives of shorebirds, it provides specific accounts of all the shorebirds likely to interest you. That makes this book a wonderful, highly readable reference for both beginning and advanced birders.

The bulk of the book consists of species accounts of 52 kinds of shorebirds known to breed in North America and my guess is that you, like me, will skip directly to species that happen to interest you at the present time. This is a great approach. One of the first shorebirds I looked up was Black-bellied Plover, a bird I have become more and more enthralled with the past several years. As I started to read, my understanding of this handsome creature immediately swelled. I didn’t realize, for instance, that it is one of the world’s most widely distributed shorebirds, or that it is called Grey Plover outside of North America. What really tickled me was learning how fearlessly aggressive these birds can be:

“On the high Arctic tundra breeding grounds,” the authors write, “this sturdy plover is a fierce protector of its large nest area, and it strikes fear into aerial predators as large as gulls and jaegers. Woe to any flying predator if it hears the whistled alarm call of Black-bellied Plover as it flies swift and low across the tundra before rising to spear the intruder in the belly with its strong bill . . .”

The 4-letter breeding code for Black-bellied Plovers is BBPL. After reading the entry for the bird in The Shorebirds of North America, however, I realized that BBPL could easily stand for “Bad-ass-bellied Plover”.

Who knew that one of my favorite birds is such a bad-ass? Similarly delightful “reveals” can be found in each account, many of them based on the authors’ own personal and scientific experiences with the birds.

Far from just being pretty to look at, the book’s incredible photos add real understanding of each species by showing them in a variety of plumages and situations. I enjoyed just quizzing myself on the photos as I made my way through the book, testing and expanding my knowledge as I went. I cannot imagine the effort Kevin T. Karlson and the book’s other photographers invested in creating what may be the world’s finest collection of shorebird photos.

Another thing I learned from The Shorebirds of North America is that the bills of oystercatchers are laterally compressed. You can’t tell this from the typical side view, but this compression turns the bills into excellent chisels for prying limpets, snails, and chitons off of rocks.

As delightful as the species accounts are, I strongly urge readers to read the entire first section straight through. In this section, the authors provide excellent perspective on all shorebirds including their remarkable adaptations, habits, diversity, and evolution. Fascinating anecdotes abound, such as the story of B-95, a banded Red Knot known to have traveled more than 400,000 miles during his 21-year lifetime. The authors don’t bother to hide their admiration for these birds:

“Challenged to design the perfect bird, we would without hesitancy delve into ranks of shorebirds and reach down to the Scolopacidae (sandpipers), the largest of the roughly six or seven family groups in the shorebird order Charadriiformes.”

Another fascinating fact I picked up from The Shorebirds of North America is that the curved bills of Long-billed Curlews are almost perfectly designed to snatch fiddler crabs from their long, curved burrows. They’re also great for picking off grasshoppers without alerting them to their imminent doom.

I could keep singing this book’s praises, but really, if you have even the tiniest, nascent interest in shorebirds, you should order a copy yourself. Given its length and full-color format, I expected the book to sell for at least fifty or sixty bucks, but at the time of this posting it can be had for a bargain $35. That puts it within reach of most people—and makes it an investment in your birding future you won’t regret.

One-Sentence Summary: A highly-readable, indispensable resource for both beginning and advanced shorebird enthusiasts.

Overall Rating (on a scale of cool birds): Piping Plover (highest)

You can order The Shorebirds of North America from your local independent bookstore, or directly from Princeton University Press. Please tell them we sent you!

(Except for the cover image, photos in this post are copyright Sneed B. Collard III. Review copy of The Shorebirds of North America provided by the publisher.)