Short-billed Dowitcher

1/200s at f10, ISO:640, Canon Mark III 1Ds w/800mm, 1.4x converter


The Short-billed Dowitcher is a medium-sized, stocky, shorebird. It is an inhabitant of North America, Middle America, and northern South America. It is strongly migratory. This species favors a variety of habitats including tundra in the north to ponds and mudflats in the south. It feeds on invertebrates often by rapidly probing its bill into mud in a sewing machine fashion. These birds nest on the ground, usually near water. Their nests are shallow depressions in clumps of grass or moss, which are lined with fine grasses, twigs and leaves. They lay four, sometimes three, olive-buff to brown eggs. Incubation lasts for 21 days and is done by both sexes. The downy juvenile birds leave the nest soon after hatching. Parental roles are not well known, but it is believed the female departs and leaves the male to tend the chicks, which find all their own food. They migrate to the southern United States and as far south as Brazil.
Churchill, Manitoba
 
06/20/2010