Thursday, September 6, 2018

A tale of tattlers

This is one of my favorite local shorebirds.  Here's a series of Wandering Tattler (Tringa incana) images from 6 September 2018.

Four different individuals, first two active and then two resting:

 


 


One individual, alert and then asleep:

 


 


In flight (a nice view of the feathers):

 


A distant photo, but showing a tattler just after it had caught a very large isopod (most likely Pentidotea wosnesenskii):

 

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5 comments:

  1. WallaWallaSeptember 7, 2018 at 3:44 PM

    Wandering Tattler!?! What a great name--do you know the origin/reason?

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  2. WallaWallaSeptember 7, 2018 at 3:48 PM

    I just found it on the Cornell ornithology webpage--it's because they travel so much and their calls alert other birds.
    But in French they are "chevalier errant," which means "wandering knights!"

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  3. Jackie SonesSeptember 7, 2018 at 9:39 PM

    Fun! Thanks for pursuing the name!

    I was curious about the "incana" portion of the scientific name. Looks like it means "gray," which seems appropriate.

    :) Jackie

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  4. AnonymousSeptember 8, 2018 at 7:14 PM

    Fabulous pictures! Did you see these on your survey yesterday?

    Carol

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  5. Jackie SonesSeptember 9, 2018 at 12:10 PM

    Thanks, Carol!

    No, the survey in the harbor was on the 7th. I've seen three tattlers at one time before, but I think this is the first time I've seen four.

    Here's the post when I saw three back in 2012:

    http://bodegahead.blogspot.com/2012/07/vermiculations-and-rippled-trill.html

    :) Jackie

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