Rock sandpiper Calidris ptilocnemis

Identification Tips:

• Length: 8 inches
• Small shorebird
• Medium-sized, thin, dark bill with yellow base
• Yellow legs
• Black patch on rump extending onto tail
• Thin, white wing stripe
• Sexes similar

Adult alternate:

• Brown and white head
• Pale indistinct supercilium with brown cheeks and crown
• Black back feathers and wing coverts with rust edges
• Brown breast with dark spots
• Black belly and white undertail coverts

Adult basic:

• Dark gray head without darker streaks
• Dark gray breast with streaks extending onto flanks
• Very dark back with thin gray edges

Juvenile:

• Similar to adult basic
• Upperparts browner than basic adult

Similar species:

This sandpiper is most likely to be found on rocks in coastal areas. Other small shorebirds are paler and lack the yellow legs and yellow-based bill. In flight, turnstones, sanderlings, and surfbirds have more white in the wings. The Purple Sandpiper is very similar in basic plumage but is found on the Atlantic Coast.

Length and wingspan from: Robbins, C.S., Bruun, B., Zim, H.S., (1966). Birds of North America. New York: Western Publishing Company, Inc.