Tuesday 20 May 2014

Temminck's Stint (Calidris temminckii)

OTHER NAMES: N/A
Latin Etymology: Calidris (bird named by Aristotle) temminckii (after Coenraad Temmick - ornithologist)
Adult Temminck's Stint (Calidris temminckii) at Cliffe Pools, Kent - March 2014

Featured Subspecies: N/A
Weight: 20-31g  /  Length: 13.5-15cm  /  Wingspan: 34-37cm
UK RED LIST / IUCN Red List: Least Concern

The Temminck's Stint is probably a drastically overlooked species in many ways - it is a fairly boring grey-brown and is utterly tiny - even next to other typically tiny waders such as ringed plover and sanderling it is quite distinctly a lot smaller, and combined with its rare passage migrant / very rare breeding status it means that this easily qualifies as one of the hardest British waders to get hold of, if not of all British birds in general.  This individual was an unplanned find - I'd attempted to see them twice before (at Oare Marshes and Summerleys) but missed them on both occasions, but after visiting Cliffe Pools to see the Black Winged Stilts, by pure chance some other birdwatchers spotted this tiny bird come in to land and were kind enough to point it out to me and let me use their scopes for better views.

Related Species:
Order: Charadriiformes
Family: Scolopacidae
Genus: Calidris
Subspecies: None - monotypic

 - Sighting Locations -
UNITED KINGDOM - A scarce breeder on remote Scottish Islands (1-4 pairs) and regular passage migrant (around 100 birds)
 - A single bird on passage at Cliffe Pools in 2014.

Further Notes: BirdForum OpusIUCN Red ListRSPBWikipedia, Xeno-canto

No comments:

Post a Comment