South Jersey Shorebirds

A miscellany of shorebirds along the Delaware Bay:

Least Sandpiper ...

Least Sandpiper

Semipalmated Plover ...

Semipalmated Plover

Short-billed Dowitcher ...

Short-billed Dowitcher

Willet ...

Willet

Horseshoe Crabs mating ...

Horseshoe Crabs mating

Dunlin ...

Dunlin

Red Knot ...

Red Knot

Short-billed Dowitcher ...

Short-billed Dowitcher

Good Birding!!

The Uncertain Future of the Red Knot

Red Knot

The Red Knot is a plump, medium sized sandpiper usually seen along our Atlantic coast during Spring and Fall migration. John James Audubon, in The Birds of America, began his description this way:

“The Knot, good reader, is a handsome and interesting species, whether in its spring or in its winter plumage, and provided it be young and fat, is always welcome to the palate of the connoisseur in dainties. As to its habits, however, during the breeding season, I am sorry to inform you that I know nothing at all, for in Labrador, whither I went to examine them, I did not find a single individual.”

We should not criticize Audubon for his failure to learn of the Red Knot’s nesting habits. The nest went undiscovered to science until June, 1909, when Admiral Peary photographed one in the high arctic after his dash to the North Pole.

Nor should we be too critical of Audubon for commenting on the Knot’s tastiness. He was a man of his time, and even scientists studied wildlife for their “usefulness” to society - in the Knot’s case, as a dainty delicacy. Its flavorfulness may even explain its name. One account of the name origin has the Danish King Canute, or Knut, dining on a strange coastal bird. His compliments to his chef led his courtiers to dub the bird, Knuts, or Knots.

An alternative account of the origin of the Red Knot’s name also features King Canute. This one notes that the Knot often feeds in the water, even as the tide is coming in. Where the Sanderling chases the waves, running to and fro with the coming and going of the tide, the Knot seems to hold its ground, as though trying to hold back the tide itself. A legend associated with King Canute has the Danish monarch attempting to hold back the tide, futilely we can be sure. Hence the association of the Knot (Calidris canutus)  and Knut.

Red Knot (with Semipalmated Sandpipers)

The Red Knot is a circumpolar nester. The North American subspecies (one of two subspecies) was once the most abundant sandpiper to be seen along the coast. Forbush reports that in spring and autumn “their hosts were marshaled on the flats of Barnstable County, and around Tuckernuck and Muskeget islands they collected in immense numbers and rose in ‘clouds’ before the sportsman’s gun.”

And, that was the first challenge faced by the Red Knot to its survival as a species - a combination of its habit to gather always in large flocks of its own kind, and the advent of modern killing technology. However, it was not the sports hunters which nearly did in the species, but the market hunters of the late nineteenth century. These exploiters employed technology and organization to “harvest” as many birds as possible and “reap” the profits. The numbers of Knots fell precipitously. The species was in danger of joining the Carolina Parakeet and the Passenger Pigeon on the list of extinct birds.

It was saved by the Federal Migratory Bird Law which went into effect in 1913. The hunting season was closed on nearly all shorebirds, and just in time for the Red Knot. In the following decades, the Red Knot recovered to some degree. Hunting still poses a danger on some of its South American wintering grounds and along migration routes in South America. But the most serious danger to the Red Knot lies in the Delaware Bay.

While a few Red Knots winter along the Atlantic coast, most winter in southern Argentina and Chile. Every year, they travel 9 to10 thousand miles to Arctic Canada to nest. On the first stage of their northward journey, they travel 3 to 4 thousand miles (usually non-stop) to the shores of the Delaware Bay. Their flight is timed so that they arrive at the Delaware Bay when the Horseshoe Crabs are crawling ashore to lay their eggs. Having burned their fat reserves, the Knots feed almost exclusively on the crab eggs.

The number of Red Knots stopping at the Delaware Day has been as high as 150,000 birds. However, by the early years of this century, the number had suddenly dropped to around 15,000 birds, a 90% decline. Surveys in South America also showed a precipitous decline. What happened?

Beginning in the 1990s, commercial fishermen began harvesting Horseshoe Crabs for use as bait in eel pots. The eels, like the shorebirds, love the eggs. The preferred time to harvest the crabs is in the spring when the females are filled with thousands of eggs. Hand harvesters work just off shore as the crabs are coming ashore and take only the females. In the 1980s, researchers normally found 100,000 eggs per square meter in the top five centimeters of soil. Now they are finding 1,000 to 5,000 eggs per square meter.

In 1982, aerial survey flights saw the beaches lined with crabs four deep (that’s vertical depth!) and miles across, and estimated the shorebird peak during the third week of May at one million birds. The survey task is much less daunting today. “Along the New Jersey coast, the ribbon of life had been abraded to frayed and broken strands. The numbers of crabs and birds reduced to a vestige,” wrote Pete Dunne just a few years ago.

The consequence for the shorebirds is that there is simply not enough food for them to regain their fat reserves for the next stage of their migration. This has been especially dire for the Red Knot, but at least five other species of shorebirds also feed heavily, if not exclusively, on the Horseshoe Crab eggs during their spring migration. All have experienced sharp population declines. For example, prior to 1988, as many as 272,000 Semipalmated Sandpipers were counted in one day along the Delaware and New Jersey shores of the Delaware Bay. After 1988, no day count has exceeded 100,000.

Conservation organizations, such as Audubon, have succeeded in convincing New Jersey and Delaware to impose limits on the harvesting of crabs along their coastlines. With abundant evidence of an ecosystem disaster in the Delaware Bay - or at least a species disaster for the Red Knot (impending extinction is rather serious disaster for a species) - one would think that the Endangered Species Act would come into play, and that the federal government would employ its considerable power to provide protection. In response to petitions, the U.S. Department of Interior said it would “fast-track”  the possibility of listing the endangered Red Knot as a “threatened” species (not endangered.) “Fast-tracking” apparently means it will take years, instead of years and years to have a decision.

In 2006 the State of New Jersey acted when the federal government did not. The state banned the harvesting of horseshoe crabs in its waters. In 2008, the Red Knot count was 15,000. In 2010, it was 24,000. Perhaps this is a sign that the crab population, and the bird population are beginning to recover. Researchers are far from breathing a sigh of relief. Keep your fingers crossed.

Canute’s sandpiper, the red-breasted sandpiper, the beach robin - C. canutus rufa, - officially the Red Knot - may not have a couple of years. Its epic migrations are in danger of becoming mere memories, tales to be read about, but never to be witnessed.

The Frayed Carpet at Reed's Beach

Reed's Beach shoreline

On the single day in May when I was able to find my way to southern New Jersey, one of my destination spots was Reed’s Beach. Reed’s Beach is not a place where people go to lie on the sand and acquire melanoma. For a couple of weeks in May, it is a birding destination of almost legendary proportions, a gathering place for tens of thousands of shorebirds on their way to the Arctic.

Or at least, it used to be. Reed’s Beach is on the Delaware Bay about twenty miles north of Cape May. It is an old coastal fishing settlement. Weather hardened men made, and still make, a living off the rich waters of the Bay. They were, and probably still are, subsistence fishermen, always working against the economics of their time - economics that squeeze hardest on those with the least. When I first visited Reed’s Beach in the 1980s, small weathered homes still held on behind the tenuous protection of the low dunes. Driving down the single road behind the dunes, one could stop anywhere and study the masses of shorebirds along the beach.

Things have changed in the last thirty years. Some of the more ragged homes in Reed’s Beach have been replaced by recreational homes. Reed’s Beach sits on the coast, and accessible waterfront property is highly coveted. A few brand new, oversized, waterfront homes have been built, perched atop the dunes, or just behind them, sitting targets for the hurricane that will one day render them rubble. I wonder if their owners are rehearsing their woeful lament at their horrible loss and have pre-researched how to collect disaster relief.

Eco-tourism has become a significant business. Bird watchers (eco-tourist) come to Cape May in May before the summer season and in the Fall, when the summer season is over. They stay in hotels, motels, and B&Bs, and they eat in restaurants. They improve the occupancy rate during the pre and post summer season. And there are more of them.

Those wandering bird watchers sometimes forget that people live in the places where they are watching birds and that other vehicles need to use the roads. The bird watchers cannot just wander in a bird daze or park in the middle of a road. In Reed’s Beach, there are now signs along the road which prohibit stopping or parking. One must drive to the end of the road where there is a small parking area and defined viewing places. Order is imposed on the many pilgrims to this legendary birding spot.

A dead Horseshoe Crab awaits the scavengers.

The reason Reed’s Beach is legendary is the horseshoe crab. In May, this primeval looking creature crawls out of the Delaware Bay to deposit eggs in the sand. Shorebirds time their migration to arrive on the Delaware Bay when the crabs are laying their eggs. One shorebird, the Red Knot, flies without stopping from Argentina to the Delaware Bay, burning its energy reserves in the process. In a few days, feeding exclusively on horseshoe crab eggs, it can replenish its reserves and continue its journey.

In the early 1980s, I can remember visiting Reed’s Beach during this migratory period. The sand was littered with dead crabs, while shorebirds obscured the beach sands with a living shorebird carpet. When some whim disturbed them, they swirled in dark clouds over the water.

The frayed carpet

More has changed at Reed’s Beach than just recreational homes and eco-tourist viewing areas. The legendary status of Reed’s Beach as a place to see breathtaking numbers of shorebirds is now something of a mystery. It just doesn’t happen. The carpet of shorebirds is badly frayed.

The last few years when I have visited Reed’s Beach, there have been plenty of Laughing Gulls, but very few shorebirds. As I searched the coast of the Delaware Bay, I always managed to find the shorebirds, and even my target species, the Red Knot, but never in large numbers. Most years I blamed myself. I had not timed my trip to southern New Jersey correctly. I was too early for the peak shorebird migration.

Red Knots in flight

My timing was better this year. The flocks of shorebirds which I saw roosting at Heislerville WMA were the largest that I have seen in many years. When they flew, they darkened the sky and blocked the horizon.

At Reed’s Beach, it was also the best I have seen in many years, especially the Red Knots. I took a photo of Red Knots in flight; there are at least three hundred birds in the picture. Feeding clusters of Red Knots on the beach numbered in the hundreds, perhaps even a few thousand. An eco-tourist on that particular day might get a hint at the legendary reputation enjoyed by Reed’s Beach. If they were in need of ticking the Red Knot on their life list, they did so easily and in multiples.

Ruddy Turnstones at Reed's Beach

Mixed among the Red Knots were Ruddy Turnstones and Semipalmated Sandpipers. From time to time a small cloud of the Semis would fly over the water paralleling the shoreline. It was a good day for shorebird viewing IF you had no memory from thirty years ago. Thirty years ago, the Red Knots numbered 150,000 and one aerial survey on one day recorded 270,000 Semipalmated Sandpipers.

In the early 1990s, commercial fishermen began harvesting horseshoe crab females, rich with eggs, in May before they reached the beach and laid their eggs. The crabs were used for bait. And the shorebirds starved.

Unfortunately, when birds burn up their fat reserves during migration, they don’t lie around on city streets starving. No camera crews appear to document their plight and outrage the viewing public. They simply disappear.

Fortunately, the researchers were heard. In 2006 the State of New Jersey acted when the federal government did not. The state banned the harvesting of horseshoe crabs in its waters. In 2008, the Red Knot count was 15,000. In 2010, it was 24,000. Perhaps this is a sign that the crab population, and the bird population are beginning to recover.

Perhaps. I would like to think that the number of Red Knots which I saw this May at Reed’s Beach is a sign of this recovery and that Reed’s Beach may once again become a shorebird viewing site of legendary proportions. Humans have a way of messing up their environment. Occasionally, we have the good sense to fix it, or at least to get out of the way so that the earth can heal itself.

I live with hope.

The Hot-Pink Sandpiper

Last week I left you hanging when I concluded with a report of a hot-pink breasted sandpiper which I saw at the Heislerville Wildlife Management Area along the Delaware Bay coast in southern New Jersey.

I was driving slowly along Matt’s Landing Road. A few lone peeps and plovers were feeding on the mud flats close to the road. A spot of color caught my attention. Even from the car, and without binoculars, I could see a small shorebird with a hot-pink breast. I pulled to the side and scrambled out of the car with camera in hand.

By the time I had taken my photographs of this hot-pink breasted sandpiper, I knew what it was. But I did not know the full story until I was back home processing my photographs and had done some internet research.

There was a time in my early bird watching career when I would have been super excited at finding some super rare bird with a hot-pink breast. I would have hurried to my books and scoured them for a sandpiper with a pink breast, and may even have tried to bend the guidebook so that it would conform with what I had seen. The temptation to make the evidence fit the conclusion is always seductive. Even the best birders and best scientists are occasionally seduced; I am not the best in either category and it certainly happens to me.

Semipalmated Sandpiper

But not this time. Everything about the bird - its size, its shape, its behavior - said Semipalmated Sandpiper, one of our smallest, and most common, peeps. Peeps are the small sandpipers which are so named because they vocalize with what is generalized as “peep.”

As I climbed back into the car, I concluded that this Semipalmated Sandpiper had acquired its hot-pink breast from researchers who were studying and tracking migrating shorebirds. Its breast had been dyed hot-pink to help in spotting the bird among the thousands of other birds with which it was traveling.

At home I processed my photographs which consists primarily of cropping in order to improve composure or to provide an enlargement of the subject. It was then that I noticed the leg bands. On the left leg there was a conventional aluminum band. The aluminum band contained a unique numeric code. The master data base for bird banding is maintained by the United States Geological Survey. When a bird is first banded, banding data is reported to the USGS, including where and when the bird was banded and who banded it. (A federal license is required.) When a bird is banded, it is also examined to determine weight, health, sex, age, and size. If the same bird is recaught by a licensed bird bander, the same information is gathered again and reported. Bands are also recovered from birds that have had fatal encounters with radio towers, windows, hunters, and your sweet house cat. Collectively, the information gathered from bird banding yields data about migration patterns, how long birds live, environmental stresses, and much more.

One document I found reported 690,000 non-game birds banded and about 8,000 recovered. That’s a 1.2% recovery rate. The smaller the birds, the lower the recovery rate. With vireos and warblers, 131,000 birds were banded; 89 were recovered. That about 6/100ths of 1%. The recovery rate for shorebirds is about 1%: 16,000 banded, 136 recovered.

The difficulty with conventional banding is that the bird must be physically captured (renetted) or recovered (e.g., found dead). Researchers look for alternate ways of gathering information without having to rely on physically holding the bird in their hands.

Semipalmated Sandpiper - green leg flag "E6N"

The hot-pink dye on the breast of the Semipalmated Sandpiper is one of those ways. The bird stands out in a crowd. A bird watcher scanning a flock of sandpipers will notice one sporting the hot color.

When I was processing my photos of the Semipalmated Sandpiper, I noticed a second band. It was a light green flag on the right leg with a three character code which I could read: “E6N.” I made some inquiries and learned of two places where the flag could be reported:

Shorebird Resighting Information: http://bandedbirds.org

USGS Reporting Encounter of Marked Bird: http://www.reportband.gov/

I also emailed my sighting, and a photograph, to New Jersey Audubon. I received this reply: “This bird was banded by NJ Audubon's research staff, almost certainly right there at Heislerville (Matt's Landing) within a few days of when you photographed it (the breast dye indicates it was banded this year). Part of our banding effort is to re-find previously banded birds, and you've helped us in our work.”

Red Knot - green leg flag "3CK"

As I continued processing my photos, I found several additional shorebirds with leg flags and reported them.

I am sure readers can see how these flags can significantly increase the number of resightings. An observer with a scope on Plum Island, in the Bay of Fundy, or along Hudson’s Bay will see the pink breast and focus on the bird. With less luck than it takes to recapture a banded bird, resighting data can be collected and entered into the data base.

Ruddy Turnstone with color-coded leg bands

Colored leg flags and dye are two of the techniques researchers use to track birds. Colored leg bands in various combinations are another technique used to track individual birds. One of the newest techniques is the use of miniaturized radio transmitters and satellite tracking; unfortunately, the expense severely limits this technique.

The first bird banded in North America was an Eastern Phoebe. In 1803, John James Audubon tied a silver thread around the legs of nestling phoebes at his family home, Millgrove, Pennsylvania. Two of those nestlings returned to Millgrove the following year, convincingly demonstrating fidelity to the natal site.

Audubon got banding started on our side of the Atlantic. Today hundreds of researchers and thousands of bird watchers continue to gather data about the migration of birds. It is all part of the ongoing effort to ensure that our next generation can enjoy good birding.

The Uncertain Future of the Red Knot

The Red Knot is a plump, medium sized sandpiper usually seen along our Atlantic coast during Spring and Fall migration. John James Audubon, in The Birds of America, began his description this way:

“The Knot, good reader, is a handsome and interesting species, whether in its spring or in its winter plumage, and provided it be young and fat, is always welcome to the palate of the connoisseur in dainties. As to its habits, however, during the breeding season, I am sorry to inform you that I know nothing at all, for in Labrador, whither I went to examine them, I did not find a single individual.”

We should not criticize Audubon for his failure to learn of the Red Knot’s nesting habits. The nest went undiscovered to science until June, 1909, when Admiral Peary photographed one in the high arctic after his dash to the North Pole.

Nor should we be too critical of Audubon for commenting on the Knot’s tastiness. He was a man of his time, and even scientists studied wildlife for their “usefulness” to society - in the Knot’s case, as a dainty delicacy. Its flavorfulness may even explain its name. One account of the name origin has the Danish King Canute, or Knut, dining on a strange coastal bird. His compliments to his chef led his courtiers to dub the bird, Knuts, or Knots.

An alternative account of the origin of the Red Knot’s name also features King Canute. This one notes that the Knot often feeds in the water, even as the tide is coming in. Where the Sanderling chases the waves, running to and fro with the coming and going of the tide, the Knot seems to hold its ground, as though trying to hold back the tide itself. A legend associated with King Canute has the Danish monarch attempting to hold back the tide, futilely we can be sure. Hence the association of the Knot (Calidris canutus) and Knut.

The Red Knot is a circumpolar nester. The North American subspecies (one of two subspecies) was once the most abundant sandpiper to be seen along the coast. Forbush reports that in spring and autumn “their hosts were marshaled on the flats of Barnstable County, and around Tuckernuck and Muskeget islands they collected in immense numbers and rose in ‘clouds’ before the sportsman’s gun.”

And, that was the first challenge faced by the Red Knot to its survival as a species - a combination of its habit to gather always in large flocks of its own kind, and the advent of modern killing technology. However, it was not the sports hunters which nearly did in the species, but the market hunters of the late nineteenth century. These exploiters employed technology and organization to “harvest” as many birds as possible and “reap” the profits. The numbers of Knots fell precipitously. The species was in danger of joining the Carolina Parakeet and the Passenger Pigeon on the list of extinct birds.

It was saved by the Federal Migratory Bird Law which went into effect in 1913. The hunting season was closed on nearly all shorebirds, and just in time for the Red Knot. In the following decades, the Red Knot recovered to some degree. Hunting still poses a danger on some of its South American wintering grounds and along migration routes in South America. But the most serious danger to the Red Knot lies in the Delaware Bay.

While a few Red Knots winter along the Atlantic coast, most winter in southern Argentina and Chile. Every year, they travel 9 to10 thousand miles to Arctic Canada to nest. On the first stage of their northward journey, they travel 3 to 4 thousand miles (usually non-stop) to the shores of the Delaware Bay. Their flight is timed so that they arrive at the Delaware Bay when the Horseshoe Crabs are crawling ashore to lay their eggs. Having burned their fat reserves, the Knots feed almost exclusively on the crab eggs.

The number of Red Knots stopping at the Delaware Day has been as high as 150,000 birds. However, by the early years of this century, the number had suddenly dropped to around 15,000 birds, a 90% decline. Surveys in South America also show a precipitous decline. What happened?

Beginning in the 1990s, commercial fishermen began harvesting Horseshoe Crabs for use as bait in eel pots. The eels, like the shorebirds, love the eggs. The preferred time to harvest the crabs is in the spring when the females are filled with thousands of eggs. Hand harvesters work just off shore as the crabs are coming ashore and take only the females. Past studies have indicated that crabs normally lay 4,000 eggs per meter. In 2005, the survey found about 1,500 per meter.

In 1982, aerial survey flights saw the beaches lined with crabs four deep (that’s vertical depth!) and miles across, and estimated the shorebird peak during the third week of May at one million birds. The survey task is much less daunting today. “Along the New Jersey coast, the ribbon of life had been abraded to frayed and broken strands. The numbers of crabs and birds reduced to a vestige,” wrote Pete Dunne just a few years ago.

The consequence for the shorebirds is that there is simply not enough food for them to regain their fat reserves for the next stage of their migration. This has been especially dire for the Red Knot, but at least five other species of shorebirds also feed heavily, if not exclusively, on the Horseshoe Crab eggs during their spring migration. All have experienced sharp population declines. For example, prior to 1988, as many as 272,000 Semi-palmated Sandpipers were counted in one day along the Delaware and New Jersey shores of the Delaware Bay. After 1988, no day count has exceeded 100,000.

When I posted the sighting of a Red Knot on Cape Ann two weeks ago, one respondent wrote: “Birders better rush to go see it since according to the National Audubon Society, the NJ Audubon Society, The American Bird Conservancy, Defenders of Wildlife, et al., ... Red Knots have less than 35 months to live and will be extinct by 2010.”

Conservation organizations, such as Audubon, have succeeded in convincing New Jersey and Delaware to impose limits on the harvesting of crabs along their coastlines. With abundant evidence of an ecosystem disaster in the Delaware Bay - or at least a species disaster for the Red Knot (impeding extinction is rather serious for a species) - one would think that the Endangered Species Act would come into play, and that the federal government would employ its considerable power to provide protection. Unfortunately, the alacrity and competence with which the current Washington administration has handled such things as natural disaster and war management, extends into the Department of Interior. The Secretary of the Interior claims the Department is “fast-tracking” the possibility of listing the endangered Red Knot as a “threatened” species (not endangered) and may have a decision in a couple of years.

Canute’s sandpiper, the red-breasted sandpiper, the beach robin - C. canutus rufa, - officially the Red Knot - may not have a couple of years. Its epic migrations are in danger of becoming mere memories, tales to be read about, but never to be witnessed.

Notes on Photos: Top - Small group of Red Knots at Matt's Landing, NJ, on Delaware Bay, May, 2006. Middle - Red Knots feeding along a jetty at Reed's Beach, NJ, on Delaware Bay, May, 2005. Bottom - Single Red Knot feeding with Ruddy Turnstones and Laughing Gulls on Reed's Beach, May, 2005

Red Knot at Hallibut Point

Yesterday (2/22) I was birding Cape Ann. At Hallibut Point State Park, we saw a winter plumage Red Knot on the rocks near the ocean edge.



Also, a drake King Eider near Bass Rocks, a drake Barrow's Goldeneye off of Eastern Point, Glaucous Gull in Gloucester Harbor and at Niles Pond, Ruddy, Ring-necked, and Redhead Ducks on Niles Pond, plus all of the usual winter suspects. A good day of winter shore birding.