Birding often becomes a search for the uncommon among the common, but what if the uncommon bird is similar to the common ones beside it? Sometimes one must look carefully and deeply to find the hidden gems, kind of like with people.
Nowhere is uncommon-among-the-common truer than with flocks of shorebirds. Before we try to identify the odd species, we must pick it out first. How best to do that?
See if something jumps out at you: You may think this an effort in futility when it comes to shorebirds; nonetheless, when I first glance over a shorebird flock, this is exactly what I do. Is there anything bigger, smaller, more active, fatter, thinner, or longer-legged? The more shorebird watching you do, the more likely it is that the birds with subtle differences will stand out. At first, perhaps a Marbled Godwit looming over its companion dowitchers will catch your eye. Next it will be the overgrown, pointy-butted peep with the Semipalmated Sandpipers, and you’ll have found your “year” White-rumped or Baird’s Sandpiper.
To use the “jumping out at you” method to best effect, first check a flock with naked eye, then with binoculars. Leave the scope to the last steps in the shorebird sifting process (I’ll get to that later).
Check ALL the habitat: Odd shorebirds often segregate themselves by habitat. For example, on CMBO’s recent School of Birding workshop at Bombay Hook, we found a Wilson’s Phalarope swimming around more or less by itself in deeper water than the yellowlegs or dowitchers were using, actually sharing the company of a juvenile Bonaparte’s Gull instead. Ruffs tend to like marsh edges, and then of course there’s the whole suite of “grasspipers,” including Baird’s and Buff-breasted, which prefer relatively drier soil and often feed in very short grass, more so than in mud.
The point is, if you have a big knot of shorebirds all huddled together and then one bird off all by its lonesome, that’s a bird you want to look at carefully.
Be HAPPY when they all fly: Somewhat counter-intuitively, finding the odd species in a group of sleeping or feeding shorebirds is often more difficult than checking a flying flock. Besides, when shorebirds shuffle the deck and land again, a once-hidden bird may now be in view.
I usually scan flying shorebird flocks starting from the back and going forward, which visually slows the flock down. Look especially for something bigger or smaller; something with an unusual bill; something brighter, darker or otherwise patterned differently; or something with a white rump or tail. It happens that many of the rarer shorebirds have white rumps or tails, including White-rumped Sandpiper, Stilt Sandpiper, Hudsonian Godwit, Curlew Sandpiper, Ruff, and Wilson’s Phalarope.
Look consciously for the “expected unexpected species”: Scanning a flock with a search image in mind is a two-edged sword, but is often better than no sword at all. If a flock of dowitchers is before you, pick through it for a Stilt Sandpiper or Hudsonian Godwit. If instead peep are swarming, look for the White-rumped or Western Sandpiper. With a search image, created from either experience or from a field guide depiction, the odd species will be more apparent when you finally bump into them.
However, if you look for a particular species, it is easy to pass over other equally interesting species because they don’t match the search image you are using. For that reason, there is a final step in sifting a shorebird flock…
Go bird-by-bird, and name and age each one: This is ultimately the best way to find rare or ultra-rare species. It is also an excellent way to go criminally insane unless you really love shorebirds. During the World Series of Birding, we jokingly refer to the business of looking at each and every shorebird as “doing lines of peep,” which can be addictive and also completely destructive to a Big Day birding effort, when there’s no time for that sort of thing. But when you have some time, there is no better way to really, really learn shorebirds.
When I’m birding alone, I’ll say the name of each species to myself: “Semipalm, Semipalm, Least, Least, Least, hey, there’s a Western,” and so forth. While leading walks and workshops, if a flock of shorebirds cooperatively arranges itself in front of us, I’ll often call out birds from left to right, encouraging participants to follow along. This might be done when birding with a friend or two, as well. By making sure everyone knows which bird is being named and then naming the birds out loud, less experienced birders enjoy confirmation of their tentative i.d.’s. Of course, it also exposes the mistakes of the person doing the naming, but the only people who don’t make mistakes are the ones who never call out a bird.