May 15th and 17th 2025 - Buff-breasted Sandpiper special days

On May 15th 2025 and again on 17th I was privileged to witness something that I had never seen before and realistically never expected to see, the breeding display of a Buff-breasted Sandpiper. With a highly restricted breeding range encompassing only the High Arctic of northernmost Alaska and Canada, where access is at best difficult and very expensive and birds are thinly spread, the chances of seeing the lek of this species is for most people a remote possibility.

Most of the information below is taken from:

https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Buff-breasted_Sandpiper/lifehistory

Buff-breasts are the only North American wader that leks with males gathering fairly close together to display to females but like Ruffs and other lecking species the males take no further part in rearing the brood. Males display in prominent raised areas in the high Arctic environment, usually along ridges, bluffs, and banks near creeks and rivers. Here, water sedge, dwarf willow, horsetail, mountain-avens, and cotton grass are common plants. Similarly, females build the nest on dry slopes or other raised locations, often not far from a stream. Other occupants of upland tundra habitat include Baird’s Sandpipers and American Golden-Plovers, and these three species are often found together during migration as well. They seek out mostly dry, flat habitats including sod farms, prairies, and many kinds of agricultural fields, so long as they are not covered by water or heavy vegetation.

As soon as they arrive on tundra nesting grounds, male Buff-breasted Sandpipers begin their rousing courtship displays. Several males (rarely up to 20) form a loose group (all within sight of each other) known as an “exploded lek,” often on dry patches of tundra near river bends. These leks last for several days. Some males frequent the same lek location, whereas others move from lek to lek, taking short flights or in some cases wandering for hundreds of miles. Their displays are unusual among shorebirds, involving at least 17 different postures and behaviours. Most often, males crouch and raise the tail and one wing, waving the wing slowly to show the bright white under surface. They also leap into the air and flutter the wings in a balletic display. When a male has attracted the attention of a female, he raises and opens both wings, raises the bill and head, puffs out the breast, stands on tip-toe, and moves forward like a wind-up toy, making the wings move up and down. A receptive female opens and raises the wings, then turns her back toward the male. Leks can seem chaotic in their activities, as males often seek to disrupt other males’ displays when females are present. Some males even try to distract others by mimicking female behaviour, and it is common to see males attempt to mate with other males at leks. Male and female do not form a pair bond; the females select nest sites, build nests, and raise young without help from males. After the breeding season, Buff-breasted Sandpipers gather in flocks for migration, like most shorebirds. They arrive on wintering grounds in flocks but soon begin to establish feeding territories there. Males often display on wintering grounds and sometimes during migration.

Buff-breasted Sandpiper populations once numbered in the hundreds of thousands to millions, but by the 1920s hunting, overgrazing, conversion of prairie to cropland, and other landscape changes had brought this species close to extinction. Their numbers increased slightly after shorebird hunting was banned in the early 20th century, but are thought to be declining again. Partners in Flight estimates the global breeding population at 56,000, rates the species a 14 out of 20 on the Continental Concern Score, and includes the species on its Yellow Watch List for species with declining populations. Habitat loss and energy development projects (including oil/gas and wind power) threaten the sites these birds use for display, nesting, and migration. The effects of climate change in the Arctic, including both sea-level rise and habitat changes, are likely to render some current nesting areas unsuitable.

male Buff-breasted Sandpiper East Halton Marshes May 15th 2025

My first Buff-breasted Sandpiper was a juvenile twitched at Blithfield Reservoir on September 21st 1980 on return from an unforgettable week in Cornwall that started with my first juvenile Spotted Sandpiper at Draycote Water on the way down and then produced not only self-found Semi-palmated Sandpiper and Aquatic Warbler but juvenile American Golden Plover, two Pectoral Sandpipers, two Wilson’s Phalaropes and a Ring-necked Duck. In early September 1981 Andrew Grieve rang me from Blacktoft to say that a juvenile Buff-breasted Sandpiper had flown from Blacktoft across the Trent towards Alkborough Flats. My first ever visit to Alkborough Flats on September 3rd duly relocated the Buff-breast feeding on burnt stubble fields with 70 Ruff.

With several notable Transatlantic flights in the 70’s and 80’s the wisdom was that it was actually easier to see Buff-breasted Sandpiper in Britain than in most of the US. A total of five autumn juveniles and an August adult followed before my first self-found local patch bird, an adult, at Chowder Ness on July 30th 2007. With six more juveniles and three adults, two in August and one on May 24th 2009 at Alkborough Flats I had amassed a total of 18 birds of this charismatic species up to the end of 2024 including two juveniles together at Rimac in September 2011. I spent a few hours lying in the dried out mud frequented by the Alkborough Flats spring bird but it never showed any inclination to display to the Arctic bound Ringed Plovers nearby. In spite of several visits to Canada and trips to Arizona, Texas and California it was the autumn of 2016 before I saw Buff-breasted Sandpiper across the pond when a juvenile was feeding with four Pectoral Sandpipers on the Spit at Campbell River, Vancouver Island.

Buff-breasted Sandpiper East Halton May 15th 2025 - feeding in sloppy mud is clearly not what Buff-breast do regularly and it ended up with a muddy bill and forehead most of the time I was watching it

So back to May 15th 2025:

It was cold with a freezing NE wind and after a morning of fruitless scanning of the local Swift flock, still only about 100, and the 30 or so House Martins and 50 Swallows I decided to look for waders around Goxhill – East Halton. A couple of Sanderling on Monday with one a superb summer male and the faint possibility of something different at Winter’s Pond saw me sitting in the car having a leisurely lunch and avoiding getting out into the cold wind. Two Whimbrel flew past and northwards after failing to find any suitable mud. But eventually it had to be done and I donned appropriate winter gear and walked to look at the one remaining good-looking pool on the mitigation area. Now this was either good or bad timing but initially it seemed like the latter. As I scanned, I could only see one Ringed Plover but unfavourably a pair of Avocets and two Lapwings on the pool two species that are usually aggressive to any other waders. Indeed, as I walked up one of the Lapwings started chasing a Little Ringed Plover around the pool then it flew at the lone Ringed Plover which flew up accompanied by the Buff-breasted Sandpiper that I had not picked up on the deck. Dam and double dam as it and the RP flew up, up and away over the hedge and out over the Humber – that was just bad timing and I was curding the time spent eating lunch when I could have been looking at a Buff-breast. The obvious thing to do seemed to be to walk down to the Humber, where it was low tide, and hope they had landed somewhere out there but a quick scan revealed many hectares of wader less mud and just three Shelduck. I walked towards Killingholme Haven checking the seaweed and upper mudflats but to no avail so I wandered back towards the car then walked up towards the pool where to my surprise the Buff-breast was feeding right next to the fence. The Lapwing seemed to have settled down so I set about taking to pictures but the light was dull and grey and almost murky. There were three or four Little Ringed Plovers on the pool and the Buff-breast seemed to be associating loosely with them but what happened when it flew and landed next to one of the LRP’s had me stunned. It suddenly started displaying towards one of the LRP’s with legs stretched and wings raised and held open showing off the amazing patterning on the underwing feathers. I fired off several shots but it was a bit distant and the background was a mess. Having seen images of this display it was truly exciting to see it in the flesh so to speak. During the next hour twice when the Buff-breast flew and landed it performed the same wing raised display sometimes strutting towards its friend and sometimes almost running with raised wings. The pattern of the upperwing proved to be almost as striking as the underwing and the bird was clearly uttering a low call while displaying but in the strong wind it was hard to hear. I managed a few more shots of the display but frustratingly thought I had got some video but I had pressed the wrong button on the camera in my excitement.

So, has a Buff-breasted Sandpiper ever displayed to a Little Ringed Plover in the past? Who knows what a vagrant in the wrong part of the world will do but for me this was a brief but mazing first and truly memorable encounter with one of the World’s best waders.