A high-octane flock of small shorebirds flew with startling speed across the Garden State Parkway, apparently abandoning one mudflat for another as the tide receded. I was driving (probably about as fast as these birds were flying) and the birds were over a quarter mile ahead of me, yet I knew exactly what they were. About 75 Dunlin were trailed by two Western Sandpipers. It wasn’t a difficult call to make - you could have made it too, if you knew what I know.
Among the relatively few things that stuck with me from college were the words of my environmental law professor. He loved to say, “Knowledge is king.” In this case, he referred to what you know versus what the other party to a lawsuit knows. The side with the most knowledge has the best chance for success.
This is true in birding, too, and with the winter months upon us and the birding slowing down some, now is the time to expand your knowledge of bird occurrence and distribution. I didn’t need a field guide to identify those sandpipers - I needed bar graphs showing what sandpiper species are common in December, which I could find, and have studied many times, in Sibley’s The Birds of Cape May. Before Sibley, I had pretty much memorized the annotated checklist in Bill Boyle’s 1986 edition of A Guide to Bird Finding in New Jersey.
Probability is HUGE in birding, and smart birders go into the field pre-equipped. This is not to say that possibility should ever be ignored—only that impossibility often should be. (The bar graph shown here is from The Birds of Cape May by David Sibley.)
In the common smallish sandpiper department there really are only two December candidates in Cape May, Sanderling and Dunlin. Sanderlings wouldn’t be flying over mudflats in significant numbers, so they had to be primarily Dunlin. What’s smaller than an 8.5” Dunlin? One of the peep, and the only reasonable possibility for a mid-December peep is Western Sandpiper. See, winter plumage shorebirds are easy!
One of the best ways to prepare for a birding trip anywhere is to lay hands on some printed material that will tell you what you could see. Virtually every area in North America now has this kind of information in great detail, often in the form of bar graphs like the one in Sibley. Periodically while traveling unfamiliar places I’ll hesitate on an identification with the question, “Is it supposed to be here?” That’s the time to check a state checklist, or maybe one from the National Wildlife Refuge or park you are birding.
Actually, that’s not quite right. The time to check the checklists and bar graphs is before you go into the field - then you’re ready when those shorebirds flash by.