mdahlem.net WWW

Aust birds    Bird names   News   1-26    Habitats    Key plants    Glossary    Plumage    Nests    Tips    Thumbnails    Gen. info    Sponsors    Photos for sale
NON-PASSERINES     1    2    3    4    5    6    7    8    9    10     11     12     13     14	15     16     17     18     19     20     21     22     23     24     25     26     PASSERINES
Common names sorted alphabetically: A   B   C   D   E   F   G   H   I   J   K   L   M   N   O   P   Q   R   S   T   W   Y

8

Wandering Tattler (Tringa [Heteroscelus] incana) Alternate name(s): "American Tattler" Size: 26-30 cm; wing span 50-55 cm Weight: 120-210 g

Australia: Family Group 8 Family Group 8 Table Red-backed Button-quail Chestnut-backed Button-quail Little Button-quail Red-chested Button-quail Painted Button-quail Black-breasted Button-quail Ruddy Turnstone Latham's Snipe Swinhoe's Snipe Painted Snipe Asian Dowitcher Bar-tailed Godwit Black-tailed Godwit Whimbrel Little Curlew Eastern Curlew Eurasian Curlew Pectoral Sandpiper Sharp-tailed Sandpiper Curlew Sandpiper Ruff Red Knot Great Knot Wandering Tattler Grey-tailed Tattler Wood Sandpiper Terek Sandpiper Common Sandpiper Green Sandpiper Buff-breasted Sandpiper Common Greenshank Marsh Sandpiper Red-necked Stint Long-toed Stint Temminck's Stint Sanderling Broad-billed Sandpiper Thumbnails page Family group table Index of bird names Habitat pages Key plants Birds home page

Similar species

Description     Classification     Distribution     Sightings     Photos     Breeding     Nest     Eggs     Behaviour     Food     Call/s

Physical description Click here for a physical description Wandering Tattlers are small waders. Their plumage is cryptic. When seen in Australia, they are in eclipse plumage. During the non-breeding season they have a light-grey throat patch, grey chest and shoulders and light-grey belly, vent and undertail coverts. The head, except for light-grey eyebrows and thin light-grey eye-rings, is all-grey. The lores and the cap are the darkest shade of grey, together with the back, including the wings. In-flight they do not show a wing bar. During the breeding season, the sides of the head and the entire front are brownish-grey, with light-grey scalloping or barring throughout. The eyes have dark irises. The dark-grey bill is straight and longer than the size of the head, with an olive-grey base of the lower mandible. The legs and feet are yellow-olive. The legs are relatively short and in flight do not protrude beyond the tail. Juveniles roughly resemble non-breeding adults, but are dark-grey, with some light-grey barring. Twitcher's tip Compared with Grey-tailed Tattlers, they have more colour contrast between front and back and a darker-grey appearance overall. Compared to other species of small sandpipers and stints, both species of tattlers have distinctive yellow legs. The correct identification of waders ("shorebirds"), e.g. of the Calidris, Tringa, Actitis and related families or of the Charadrius, Pluvialis and related genera in the field can be quite tricky. We have therefore made an attempt to give some advice HERE.

Taxonomy, classification See Wandering Tattler at Wikipedia .

Range, habitat, finding this species Click here for information on habitat and range The overall distribution of this species can be assessed, and specific locations where birds have been spotted can be found, based on individual sighting reports submitted by birdwatchers to ebird.org . The global distribution of the Wandering Tattler is available HERE . Wandering Tattlers are a strongly migratory species. Their breeding grounds are located on both sides of the northern Pacific, in far-eastern Russia, the Aleutian islands, Alaska, north-western Canada and down the North American West coast. They spend the northern winters farther South, either down the American West coast, as far as Peru, Galapagos and Hanga Roa, on any of the Pacific islands (including Papeete and Hawaii), or down the East Asian coastline, via Japan, Taiwan and the Philippines into eastern Indonesia, New Guinea, Oceania, to Australia and northern New Zealand. Wandering Tattlers are uncommon migrants to Australia from the North. They are occasionally seen along the North-East coast of the continent, from the tip of Cape York peninsula, all along the QLD coastline, down to the NSW far North coast. Wandering Tattlers have a strong preference for rocky habitats, such as open reefs and coastal rockfaces.

Sightings Click here for sighting information M. Mearns reports spotting a Wandering Tattler on Lady Elliot Island, off the QLD coast near Agnes Water, in January 2006 and again in January 2016. H. Mouritsen reports spotting a Wandering Tattler on One Tree Island, Capricornia Cays NP, near Rockhampton, QLD, in January 2011. Two Wandering Tattlers in non-breeding were spotted by C. Hayne at Flat Rock Beach, Skennars Head, 10 km North-East of Ballina, NSW, in early January 2013. M. Eaton reports finding Wandering Tattlers at Caloundra Headland, QLD, in January 2018. Another was found at Flat Rock, Ballina, NSW, in January 2023.

Photos

ADULT

Sex unknown

NON-BREEDING

Frontal view of a Wandering Tattler in non-breeding plumage (photo courtesy of M. Eaton)
[Flat Rock, Ballina, NSW, January 2023]

Near-frontal view of a Wandering Tattler in non-breeding plumage (photo courtesy of M. Eaton)
[Flat Rock, Ballina, NSW, January 2023]

Near-frontal view of a Wandering Tattler in non-breeding plumage (photo courtesy of M. Eaton)
[Caloundra, QLD, January 2018]

Near-lateral view of a Wandering Tattler in non-breeding plumage (photo courtesy of H. Mouritsen)
[One Tree Island, Capricornia Cays NP, QLD, January 2011]

Close-up lateral view of a Wandering Tattler in non-breeding plumage looking towards the observer
(photo courtesy of M. Eaton)
[Flat Rock, Ballina, NSW, January 2023]

Lateral view of a Wandering Tattler in non-breeding plumage (photo courtesy of M. Eaton)
[Caloundra, QLD, January 2018]

Lateral view of a preening Wandering Tattler in non-breeding plumage (photo courtesy of M. Mearns)
[Lady Elliot Island, near Agnes Water, QLD, January 2016]

Lateral/near-dorsal view of Wandering Tattlers in non-breeding plumage on a rockface (photo courtesy of M. Eaton)
[Caloundra, QLD, January 2018]

Close-up near-dorsal view of a Wandering Tattler in non-breeding plumage looking sideways (photo courtesy of M. Eaton)
[Flat Rock, Ballina, NSW, January 2023]

Close-up dorsal view of a Wandering Tattler in non-breeding plumage looking sideways (photo courtesy of M. Eaton)
[Flat Rock, Ballina, NSW, January 2023]

Dorsal view of a Wandering Tattler in non-breeding plumage (photo courtesy of M. Eaton)
[Caloundra, QLD, January 2018]

Dorsal view of a Wandering Tattler in non-breeding plumage (photo courtesy of M. Mearns)
[Lady Elliot Island, near Agnes Water, QLD, January 2016]

Food, Diet

Frontal view of a Wandering Tattler in non-breeding plumage gobbling up its prey (photo courtesy of M. Eaton)
[Flat Rock, Ballina, NSW, January 2023]

Lateral view of a Wandering Tattler in non-breeding plumage with its prey (photo courtesy of M. Eaton)
[Flat Rock, Ballina, NSW, January 2023]

Wandering Tattler in non-breeding plumage prying its prey from a tiny rock pool (photo courtesy of M. Eaton)
[Caloundra, QLD, January 2018]

These pages are largely based on our own observations and those of our contributors. The structure of these bird pages is explained HERE. For more salient facts on any bird species please refer to a field guide.

Would you like to contribute photos or sound recordings to this site? If interested, please CLICK HERE. Credits to contributors are given HERE.

Disclaimer: Comments are always welcome. We give no guarantee that the information presented on these pages is always correct or up-to-date. External links are marked as such and we take no responsibility for the contents of external pages. All images on this site are protected by copyright & used by permission of the respective owners. If you wish to reproduce them or any of the material presented on this web site, please contact us: We hereby acknowledge the original custodians of the land which is described on these pages, including the Gomeroi/Gamilaraay people of the North-west Slopes and Plains of NSW, and the traditional owners of other lands and nations within this country. We acknowledge elders past, present and emerging. Sovereignty was never ceded.          Last updated: Tue, 17 January 2023, 0:58 +00:00