Baird's Baird's Baird's

I spent my first morning at Tiscornia today in what felt like forever. It'd been long enough that practically half of the Ring-billeds were showing the starts of winter head marking without me noticing that any had started the process.

I spotted a Black-bellied Plover on Kloch from Tiscornia, a year bird (I need an embarrassing number of the larger shorebirds, this was one, though I think Avocet would have been a little more likely) and started walking, hoping for a pic. It was long gone by the time I arrived, but I did encounter a total of 5 juvenile Baird's Sandpipers in amongst the (adult) Sanderling as I walked north.

This one was the most cooperative.

Here's the more typical view, a long-winged flat-bodied buffy brown-fronted peep with a slightly drooped bill and a scaly back (the eye ring isn't as prominent in this pic).

The Bairds' were feeding on drowned insects washed up at the water's edge, in this case a small moth.

Another view of the scaling as the bird stretches its wings...

... and a Semipalmated Sand for comparison (note you can actually get a sense of the semi-palmation on the trail foot)