Least Sandpiper
Calidris minutilla

Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Subphylum: Vertebrata
Class: Aves
Order: Charadriiformes
Family: Scolopacidae
Genus: Calidris

Audio for Species

Call
Call

from Macaulay Library

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Additional Least Sandpiper Pictures

Description

Length: 5.1-5.9 in (13-15 cm) Weight: 0.7-1.1 oz (19-30 g ) Wingspan: 10.6-11 in (27-28 cm)

A very small shorebird, with a short, thin, dark bill that is slightly decurved. Their legs are yellow. A thin, white wing stripe. There is a black line on rump extends onto tail. The head is brown with an indistinct white supercilium with darker crown and eyeline. The underparts are white, and there are black spots on the breast. The abult basic plumage is similar, except the plumage is a gray-brown and the have a gray-brown breast band.

Habitat, Range, and Feeding

They winter in a wide variety of wetlands like: Intertidal muddy and shallow lagoons, brackish or freshwater herbaceous swamps, muddy openings in mangrove forests, inland ditches, flooded ricefields, lakes, ponds, and salt marshes.
Breeding mainly in subarctic tundra, mossy and grassy bogs, and far northern boreal forest, they prefer coastal wetlands or subalpine sedge meadows for nesting but will nest in sand dune habitats at the southern extremes of its breeding range.
The male makes several scrapes and the female chooses one. He uses his body to press down vetation on the ground near water. The clutch size is 4 eggs that are a pale buff,spotted with brown. The incubation period is 19 to 23 days. They leave the nest within one day, but the chicks will take short ventures from the nest after hatching. To get them away from the nest the parent will go a few feet from the nest and call them; the chicks go to the parent, they then brood. The parent will walk off again and call them to another brood-rearing area, this is repeated several times. The chicks feed for themselves on that first day, but will brood for a few days for warmth. The chicks stay together until they fledge, and parests stay in the brooding area until they fledge, up to 23 days.

They peck and probe in damp mud for benthic and terrestrial invertebrates.