Unique Sandpipers

     Four kinds of sandpipers are unique in eastern North America.  Most species of sandpipers live in flocks on mud flats and beaches the bulk of their lives, except when hatching and raising chicks for a couple of months on the ground of the treeless Arctic tundra.  All sandpipers feed on invertebrates.  And the females of all species of sandpipers lay four eggs in a clutch, which demonstrates the ancestry they share. 
     But spotted sandpipers, solitary sandpipers, upland sandpipers and American woodcocks, departed from the usual way of sandpiper group life on flats and beaches and adapted to other habitats.  And three of these kinds of sandpipers, as most species in their family of birds, but not woodcocks, spend northern winters in Central and South America. 
     Spotted sandpipers nest along the edges of most every waterway and impoundment throughout the Lower 48, and into much of Canada and Alaska.  Spotties are light-brown above, which camouflages them, and white below, with dark spots all over during their breeding season.  They bob and dance when they walk along the shores of water, which is another form of blending in as a guard against predation.  Their dancing mimics bits of debris bouncing in the wavelets along the shore.
     Because of the tightness of their small, inland habitats, spotties don't gather into flocks.  They move about individually or as isolated pairs.
     Solitary sandpipers are another species of loners, for the most part, again because of their habitat that is restricted in size.  Solitaries are dark gray above with many white spots, good plumage pattern for living in the dark shadows of woods.  Solitaries have a buoyant, butterfly-like flight, rather than the swift, straight-forward flight of most of their relatives in flocks in wide open spaces.  Solitaries' way of flying allows this forest sandpiper to effectively flutter among tightly-growing trees.  The habitats of all species of life shape them.
     Solitaries nest in abandoned thrush, blackbird and jay nests in spruce trees near lakes and rivers in the boreal forests of Canada and Alaska.  Hatching youngsters in other birds' cradles in tree tops is a departure from the usual sandpiper habits of hatching young on the ground.  The precocious, fuzzy solitary young must jump from their nurseries soon after hatching to feed on invertebrates on the forest floors.
     Inland sandpipers are a species of dry, tall-grass prairies.  Some of this type of sandpiper moved east to breed when the eastern forests were cleared for farmland.  But inlanders are rare in the east because they will only hatch babies in tall grass habitats, which are also rare in the east.
     Inland sandpipers arrive in North America in April with the intent to nest there.  Males float high in the sky over their nesting territories and utter several haunting whistles that can barely be heard by us on the ground.  Each whistle first ascends the scale of notes, then descends those same notes.  When this type of sandpiper lands on the ground or a fence, he or she raises their wings high, perhaps as a signal of some sort, before tucking them away.  
     American woodcocks are a sandpiper that lives on leafy woodland floors.  Their feathering camouflages them well in that habitat and their long beaks pull earthworms from the soft, moist ground of wooded bottom lands.
     Male woodcocks engage in interesting and entertaining courtship displays every evening from about the middle of February through most of April, weather permitting.  Soon after sunset, each male woodcock flutters out of a damp, bottom land woods and lands on a patch of bare soil in a clearing near the woodland.  There he stands upright with his beak on his chest and "beeps" about once per second for around a minute.  Then he takes off in upward, spiral flight, while his wings twitter rhythmically, until he is a speck in the sky.  There he sings a few notes in each of several series of notes for up to 15 seconds before plunging to Earth to start his display again and again until hunger or receptive females interrupt him. 
     These sandpiper species have traits that are departures from those of the bulk of their relatives.  Those characteristics are what make these sandpipers unique, and interesting.  But these sandpipers must be looked for because with camouflage and cautious habits, they are not easy to find, however common they may be.