I was taking a relaxed stroll on the beaches of Havelock Island when I spotted these Caspian Plovers or at least that’s what I think they are.
They might also be the Lesser Sand Plovers. These cannot be the Greater Sand or Oriental Plover as they are small,. But, I can be wrong. Would you know which plover they are? Any help in identification would be appreciated.
Hi Sankara,
ReplyDeleteWhen you say that they are too 'small' for Greater Sand Plovers or Oriental Plovers, how are you judging the size? Your post nicely illustrates the difficulty of assessing size when you have nothing of known size to refer to. Neither the water nor the rock give an appropriate reference point, so, based on this photo alone, it's quite impossible to accurately judge size.
Without this, we need to look at other clues such as shape and patterns of plumage. The former confirms that they are plovers, while an examination of the latter shows that these birds do not have uniform plain upperparts, as would be the case if they were any of the species you have mentioned. Rather, the upperpart feathers appear to be variegated, dark and light. There is no evident breastband, and the head shows a prominent pale eyebrow and dark spot behind the eye. All these features help identify the birds as Pacific Golden Plovers (which are actually larger than the plover species you mention!)
Hi Dave,
ReplyDeleteThank you for dropping by my blog :-)
I was judging their size based on what I saw. As you rightly pointed out, there was nothing in the vicinity for me to measure against.
Like you said, these ones look like the female species of the pacific golden plover, but they have much longer legs. And that is why I am still confused :-) What do you think?