Solitary Sandpiper

The Solitary Sandpiper is a slim, medium-small member of the Tringa genus best known for its unsociable habits. Where most sandpipers gather in flocks along open shorelines, this species is typically encountered singly, picking its way along the muddy fringe of a small woodland pool or roadside ditch.

Upperparts are dark olive-brown to blackish, finely peppered with small white spots that give the plumage a subtly speckled look at close range. The underparts are white, the neck and upper breast lightly streaked with gray-brown, and a crisp white eye-ring stands out against the dark face. The legs are dull greenish-yellow to olive, and the bill is straight, thin, and blackish.

In flight the Solitary Sandpiper shows dark, unbarred underwings and a dark rump and tail with white barring on the outer tail feathers — quite different from the bold white rump patches of many of its relatives.

Key field marks

• Dark olive-brown upperparts finely spotted with white
• Bold white eye-ring on an otherwise plain dark face
• Dark rump and central tail (no white rump flash) with barred outer tail feathers
• Dark, unbarred underwings visible in flight — a good clincher
• Greenish-yellow legs and a thin, straight, dark bill
• Frequent gentle bobbing of the rear body, though less exaggerated than a Spotted Sandpiper

Similar species

• Spotted Sandpiper: constantly teeters its whole body, has a white wedge in front of the folded wing, and shows a bold white wingstripe in flight; breeding birds are heavily spotted below.
• Lesser Yellowlegs: notably larger, bright yellow legs, white rump, more elegant and long-necked.
• Green Sandpiper (Eurasian, its closest relative): darker overall with even bolder white rump contrast and blacker underwings; ranges do not normally overlap.
• Wood Sandpiper (Eurasian): paler, more spotted above, with a prominent pale eyebrow and a contrasting white rump, unlike the Solitary's dark rump.

Habitat

True to its name, the Solitary Sandpiper favors small, often shaded freshwater sites that other shorebirds ignore: forest pools, beaver ponds, flooded ditches, sewage lagoons, and muddy stream edges, frequently under a partial canopy of trees.

Range and migration

It breeds across the boreal forest of Canada and Alaska and winters from Mexico south through Central and South America. During migration it passes through nearly all of the continental United States as a scattered, low-density traveler rather than in the large flocks typical of other sandpipers, usually appearing as a lone bird at an inconspicuous wet spot.

Behavior

Unlike almost every other sandpiper, the Solitary Sandpiper nests in trees. It lays its eggs in the abandoned nests of songbirds — American Robins, Rusty Blackbirds, and other passerines — built in conifers near water, a highly unusual strategy among shorebirds.

Voice

The flight call is a sharp, high-pitched "peet" or "peet-weet," thinner and more strident than the similar call of the Spotted Sandpiper.

Feeding

It forages by walking deliberately through shallow water and mud, sometimes vibrating a foot to stir up prey, picking and probing for aquatic insect larvae, small crustaceans, and other invertebrates.

Nesting and breeding

Because it uses old tree nests rather than building its own, the Solitary Sandpiper avoids the ground-nest predation risks faced by most shorebirds; the female lays a small clutch and both adults help tend the young after they leave the nest.