Common sandpiper

Common sandpiper
File:Actitis hypoleucos - Laem Pak Bia.jpg
Adult, Laem Pak Bia, Thailand File:Common Sandpiper (Actitis hypoleucos) (W1CDR0001405 BD3).ogg Bird recorded in Scotland
Conservation status
Least Concern Least Concern  (IUCN 3.1)
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Aves
Order:	Charadriiformes
Family:	Scolopacidae
Genus:	Actitis
Species:	A. hypoleucos
Binomial name
Actitis hypoleucos (Linnaeus, 1758)
File:ActitisHypoleucosIUCNver2018 2.png
Range   Breeding   Non-breeding   Passage   Possibly extant (non-breeding)   Possibly extant (passage)
Synonyms
Tringa hypoleucos Linnaeus, 1758

Video of individual bird foraging in water by stabbing with its beak near muddy bank with seashells, then of bird preening itself in shoreside vegetation, then of bird feeding in shallow water

Actitis hypoleucos

The common sandpiper (Actitis hypoleucos) is a small Palearctic wader. This bird and its American sister species, the spotted sandpiper (A. macularia), make up the genus Actitis. They are parapatric and replace each other geographically; stray birds of either species may settle down with breeders of the other and hybridize. Hybridization has also been reported between the common sandpiper and the green sandpiper, a member of the closely related genus Tringa.

Taxonomy

The common sandpiper was formally described by the Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus in 1758 in the tenth edition of his Systema Naturae under the binomial name Tringa hypoleucos. The species is now placed together with the spotted sandpiper in the genus Actitis that was introduced in 1811 by the German zoologist Johann Karl Wilhelm Illiger. The genus name Actitis is from Ancient Greek aktites meaning "coast-dweller" from akte meaning "coast". The specific epithet hypoleucos combines the Ancient Greek hupo meaning "beneath" with leukos meaning "white". The species is monotypic and no subspecies are recognised.

Description

The adult is 18–20 cm (7.1–7.9 in) long with a 32–35 cm (13–14 in) wingspan. It has greyish-brown upperparts, white underparts, short dark-yellowish legs and feet, and a bill with a pale base and dark tip. In winter plumage, they are duller and have more conspicuous barring on the wings, though this is still only visible at close range. Juveniles are more heavily barred above and have buff edges to the wing feathers.

This species is very similar to the slightly larger spotted sandpiper (A. macularia) in non-breeding plumage. But its darker legs and feet and the crisper wing pattern (visible in flight) tend to give it away, and of course they are only rarely found in the same location.

Distribution and migration

The common sandpiper breeds across most of temperate and subtropical Europe and Asia, and migrates to Africa, southern Asia and Australia in winter. The eastern edge of its migration route passes by Palau in Micronesia, where hundreds of birds may gather for a stop-over. They depart the Palau region for their breeding quarters around the last week of April to the first week of May.

Behaviour and ecology

The Common Sandpiper is usually encountered alone, occasionally in small groups, although larger flocks are sometimes formed around migration or at breeding season roosts. It seldom joins multispecies flocks. This species has a distinctive stiff-winged flight, low over the water.

File:Actitis hypoleucos MHNT.jpg

Egg

File:Common Sandpiper (Actitis hypoleucos) probing mud banks in Kolkata I IMG 4169.jpg

Wintering bird foraging matakakoni-style in Puri

Breeding

It nests on the ground near freshwater. When threatened, the young may cling to their parent's body to be flown away to safety.

Feeding

The common sandpiper forages by sight on the ground or in shallow water, picking up small food items such as insects, crustaceans and other invertebrates; it may even catch insects in flight.

Conservation

It is widespread and common, and therefore classified as a species of least concern on the IUCN Red List but is a vulnerable species in some states of Australia. The common sandpiper is one of the species to which the Agreement on the Conservation of African-Eurasian Migratory Waterbirds (AEWA) applies.

Relationship to humans

In the Nukumanu language of the Nukumanu Islands (Papua New Guinea), this species is usually called tiritavoi. Another Nukumanu name for it, matakakoni, exists, but this is considered somewhat taboo and not used when children and women are around. The reason for this is that matakakoni means "bird that walks a little, then copulates", in reference to the pumping tail and thrusting head movements the Actitis species characteristically perform during foraging.

External links

• Ageing and sexing (PDF; 5.5 MB) by Javier Blasco-Zumeta & Gerd-Michael Heinze
• Common sandpiper species text in The Atlas of Southern African Birds
• BirdLife species factsheet for Actitis hypoleucos
• Common sandpiper photo gallery at VIREO (Drexel University)
• Audio recordings of Common sandpiper on Xeno-canto.
• Actitis hypoleucos in Field Guide: Birds of the World on Flickr