A few shorebirds (and an impostor)

This black-bellied plover (Pluvialis squatarola) was hunkered down in the sand, and stayed that way the entire time Jessa and her camera were present, but it hardly matters, as the bird is in winter plumage and does not currently have its namesake black belly. It probably needs the rest: inveterate travelers, black-bellied plovers nest in the high Arctic and winter on every continent except Antarctica.

The piping plover (Charadrius melodus), on the other hand, is an exclusively North American species.  There is an inland population—they nest on sandbars on the Platte River here in Nebraska—but piping plovers are more typical of sandy coastal beaches.

Their congener, the killdeer (C. vociferus), is found almost everywhere on the continent.

Jessa took most of the photos in this post, but I shot these American avocets (Recurvirostra americana) at Grand Isle. More to come.

The ruddy turnstone, Arenaria interprens, has at various times been classified as a plover and as a sandpiper. Like the black-bellied plover, it is a cosmopolitan bird, nesting in the Arctic and wintering on six continents. These birds are in their winter plumage, but even so the harlequin pattern is distinctive.

Sanderlings (Calidris alba) are familiar as the "clockwork sandpipers" that advance and recede with the waves. Utterly charming.

The Alaskan-nesting western sandpiper, C. mauri, is one of several Calidris species known collectively as "peeps". (Sanderlings are a disputed peep, but I count them in.) Quick test: ask someone to define "peeps". If they respond "small Calidris sandpipers", you're talking to a birder. If they respond "marshmallow chicks", you're not. (And if they answer "people", just say "Aww, that's adorbs!", pat them on the head, and walk away.)

Peep tracks.

The northern cardinal (Cardinalis cardinalis) is a passerine, not a shorebird, but this one was doing his best to fit in. And here on the beaches of Pontchartrain, perhaps we should call him a southern cardinal...