By Jim Burns

The plovers, with their plump bodies, large eyes, and short, straight, rather bulbous bills are a typical of the shorebird group in some ways.  Many of them are only short distance migrants and most of them can be found at certain times of the year in upland pastures, we meadows, and open fields rather than places we would consider shoreline.

A)  Good Photo, Easy Bird

If we named all our species for what we see rather than for what we hear, this would be our "Double-ringed Plover,: the most widespread and most familiar of all our shorebirds.  No other plover, no other shorebird, has the double black breastband of the Killdeer.  Be careful though, for young Killdeer just out of the nest have only a single band, and some our other ringed plovers with black facial markings such as Semipalmated and Wilson's might appear double banded with only a cursory or long distance look

Typically, because of what we hear, Killdeer do not present any identification problem.  This is, after all, Charadrius vociferus, and many shorebird aficionados consider Killdeer the most annoying of birds because if there is one near the wader flock you are maneuvering to study, guaranteed it will sentinel them all away with its strident cries.  On the unlikely chance you see a silent Killdeer in flight, watch for the white wing stripe and the rusty rump patch.  Killdeer are the masters of the broken wind charade meant to distract you away from the nest which is often only a scrape on bare ground or gravel

Killdeer do migrate form the northern limits of their range, but here in Arizona thy are year round residents.  More will be seen during migration and winter as numbers swell with transient and nonresident birds.  this Killdeers was photographed at Painted Rock Dam July 25, 1993.

B) Good Photo, Difficult Bird

Here's another plover with a single black breastband.  It is boldly patterned with well defined field marks.  The breastband is complete but not particularly wid, but is sorting out the small plovers be aware that the breastband can appear either broad or narrow depending on the posture of an individual bird, so width itself is not a good field mark.

The face is marked by two black bands separated by the white forehead.  These bands meet in front of the eye and continue on 

behind it to form a well defined black auricular (ear) patch.  There is an obvious white supercilium (eyebrow), and the short, stubby bill is obviously bi-colored.  Te overall tonal difference between upper and underparts appears about the same as our Killdeer in the first photograph.

Since we're not sure this bird was photographed in Arizona, we cannot eliminate Piping and Wilson's Plovers simply be geographical range, so there would seem to be five possibilities, five plovers with a single dark breastband:   Piping, Wilson's, Semipalmated, Snowy, and fledging Killdeer, Let's eliminate young Killdeer because our bird appears robust, yet short-legged, nothing like a spindly, long-legged young Killdeer with its uniformly dark bill.

Wilson's Plovers also show a completely dark bill in all plumages.  Additionally, through the contrast between upper and under in a Wilson's would be about the same as the quiz bird's, Wilson's typically pauses in its feeding in a quite recognizable upright posture, much more vertical and very unlike the horizontal posture of the bird in the photograph.  this is not a Wilson's Plover.

Snowy plovers, too, have uniformly dark bills in all plumages and, as their name implies, the contrast between upper and under is much greater in Snowies than our photograph shows.  Snowy Plover upperparts are usually described at "light gray-brown."  The clinching field marks for Snowy Plover, however, are the bands.  Snowies' breast band is incomplete, often described as "breast patches".  There is a forehead band and black auricular patch, but only in breeding plumage, and Snowies never show a band from cheek to cheek across the bill.  This is not a Snowy Plover.

Piping Plovers in breeding plumage will show a bill similar to our bird's, two-toned, bright orange at the base, black at the tip.   Pipings also have a breastband, a headband, and a white eyebrow stripe like our quiz bird.  However, in all plumages they lack the black auriculars and the cheekband, so their face appears much plainer.  The upperparts of the Piping are the lightest of any of our candidates and are described at "dry sand."  Pipings are ghostly little plovers, easy to over look.  This is not a Piping Plover.

Semipalmated Plovers is our most boldly marked and most common migrant plover.  It is a long distance migrant which may pass through Arizona quite early  in the "fall."  There are Maricopa County records from the second week in July.  Semipals breed in the Arctic and winter to southern South America.  this didn't seem such a difficult identification, but if you caught the play on words in the clue, you know we're not quite finished.  My apologies.  I just couldn't help myself.. This is not a Semipalmated Plover.

Charadrius Semipalmatus.  Ever wonder exactly where that odd work "semipalmated" cam from?  From Latin, literally "half hand."  Look at the back of your hand.  There's a little webbing between each finger.  Look at the quiz bird's feet.  There's no webbing between the toes.  This Common Ringed Plover was photographed

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PRESIDENT'S COLUMN

By  Scott Burge

The primary relationship of the MAS (and most other chapters) with the NAS appears to be undergoing very drastic changes in which the funds for chapters and their volunteer programs will be sacrificed for professionally managed state programs.  In this new environment, it is not known whether chapters such as the MAS will be capable of continuing to subsidize the largely uninvolved NAS- recruited members with local programs and publications.  

Over 100 years ago, ladies pulled the plumes form their hats and started what would become the NAS.  Committed volunteers made the difference then and it is committed volunteers that make the difference today.  Any organization that exhausts and alienates its volunteer base for the sake of recruiting inactive members and corporate sponsors to fund paid staff will find its ability to inspire people diminished.  A great Arizona sage (and sometimes environmental friend) Sam Stieger stated a law known as Stieger's Law concerning government.  It appears appropriate in this instance.  I will paraphrase the Mayor of Prescott: "Whenever you create and agency, the natural response of the created agency is to worry more about the structure of the agency than the mission."  It appears that the NAS has created a bureaucracy and one avenue to feed it is to reduce the chapters and their volunteers to an increasingly smaller role in the organization.  Let's go back to the original question, "What about the birds?"  The typical response form NAS is "Don't bother us now, we're reorganizing."

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C) Bad Photo, Easy Bird

Our third plover looks like it is actually on a shore.  Unfortunately it is smaller in the frame and quartered away from us so that we are not getting as clean a look at its diagnostic field marks as we did with our first two birds.  We have enough, though.  We can see the black headband, the black auriculars, and the black breastband which, if we look closely enough, we can tell is not complete.  The bill and lets are uniformly colored and

Snowy Plover is listed as a summer transient and rare breeder in Arizona.  There have been no confirmed nestings at Wilcox since the early '80s, but Snowies nested at Painted Rock Dam in Maricopa county After the floods of '93.  Wilson's Plover winters as close as the Gulf of California and has been recorded at the Salton Sea.  Piping Plover is a threatened and endangered species seen occasionally on the California coast.  Common Ringed Plover is Arctic dream.  Arctic dreams are good in Arizona's summer heat.

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