Here comes that most dreaded birding column of the year: Shorebirds.
I customarily preach that bird identification is easier than it looks, and anybody can do it. Alas, that wisdom does not apply to shorebirds.
If you want bird identification to be simple and easy, just avoid birding along the shoreline – right?
Wrong.
While most of the shorebirds that torment birders are found at the shore, some are not. Even some that are normally found along the ocean’s edge can pop up inland.
Essex Woods in Bangor is one of those places where several shorebird species appear later in summer.
So rather than avoid shorebirds altogether, perhaps this is your year to conquer the little dickens. Maybe it’s time to play in the mud.
Mud, of course, is the problem. Many shorebirds are small and difficult to approach, especially in the mud. A spotting scope will come in handy, though it’s not necessary.
Here are some tips, tricks and shortcuts to get you started:
First, divide and conquer. Shorebird flocks are usually big, made up of multiple species. Rather than trying to identify each bird, first sort them all into different piles.
The first pile is all the shorebirds listed in your field guide that are unlikely to be in Maine. Next to that pile is a pile of shorebirds that are findable in Maine, but not at the seashore. You’ll never catch an American woodcock near salt water. Wilson’s snipe and solitary sandpipers are freshwater marsh birds. Upland sandpipers are grassland birds. There are three species of phalarope that mostly swim for their suppers – they are never found on mudflats.
So, throw out these piles. That eliminates almost a third of the field guide birds from consideration.
Next, sort by size. The bigger ones tend to be easier to identify, because it’s easier to see their field marks at a distance. Plus, most have one or two distinctive features that stand out.
Just the bill alone can tell a tale. Godwits have bills that tilt up. Avocets have bills that curve up. Whimbrels have bills that curve down. Oystercatchers have long, bright red bills.
The small ones are the toughest, because they often look so much alike. Fortunately, they can be lumped into three distinct groups: sandpipers, plovers and similar-sized birds that aren’t sandpipers or plovers. Sandpipers have longer, skinnier bills. Plovers have shorter, heavier bills.
Plovers are easy enough to sort out. Only the piping plover is as small as a semipalmated plover, and it prefers sandy beaches to mudflats. You sometimes see a killdeer on the beach, but it’s a grassland plover that’s more likely found around the Bangor Mall. Black-bellied plovers are twice the size of semipalmated plovers.
On a Maine mudflat, least and semipalmated sandpipers are the most numerous sandpipers, while semipalmated plovers are the most plentiful plovers. Now it’s just a matter of looking for birds that are different from the majority.
White-rumped, western and Baird’s sandpipers sometimes lurk among the smallest sandpipers. Sanderlings are small, but noticeably bigger than semipalmated sandpipers. It’s a matter of watching for any birds that “don’t quite look right.” That’s easier than it sounds, because the oddballs are surrounded by birds that do “look right.”
What size is a medium-sized shorebird? Ugh. For me, it’s a shorebird that’s bigger than the little ones, but smaller than the big ones. Not helpful, I know.
Most medium and large-sized shorebirds are distinctive and easily identifiable. However, there are troublesome pairs that require extra attention.
Greater and lesser yellowlegs are equally common in Maine. American golden-plovers are uncommon, but sometimes keep company with black-bellied plovers. Short-billed dowitchers are widespread, but long-billed dowitchers – a bird from the western interior states – venture eastward regularly. Marbled and Hudsonian godwits visit Maine sporadically, and it takes a second glance to determine which one you’re looking at.
So now you’ve sorted the shorebirds into piles. There’s a pile of western species that don’t occur in Maine. There are three piles of small, medium and large shorebirds that do occur here.
Each of these piles is further divided into piles of sandpipers, plovers and oddballs. After this quick sorting, you’re usually down to one remaining possibility – your correct identification.
Most shorebirds on Maine’s mudflats are gradually migrating southward from their nesting territories in the subarctic. They’re trickling in now, and the trickle will become a torrent by mid-August. The wave will begin to subside after Labor Day. Now is the time to play in the mud.
