Red-necked Stint (Calidris ruficollis)

Red-necked Stint (Calidris ruficollis)
Frank's Dump, Hayward Regional Shoreline, Hayward, Alameda County, CA
13 July 2016
Joseph Morlan

This bird was first photographed by Vicki Robinson and identified from the photos by Bob Toleno on Sunday 10 July 2016. It has been seen and photographed everyday since then, but most sightings have been in the late afternoon during high tide. I was heading home from Monterey on Wednesday 13 July and decided to swing by Hayward and look for this rare bird which had been brilliantly photographed on previous days. I arrived in the mid-afternoon with much mudflat still present and large numbers of Western Sandpipers foraging on the mudflats. There were also several hundred Western Sandpipers roosting on islands in the impoundment known locally as "Frank's Dump." I spent a couple of hours scanning the shorebirds as carefully as I could. Eventually more birders arrived and finally Francis Toldi spotted the bird near the back of a large group of loafing Western Sandipers. All observers including Mike and Alma Rogers, Judith Dunham, Roy Carlson, Gary Deghi, Michael Park and many others were afforded satisfying views. Although the bird was quite distant, the light was good and its bright rufous coloration made it relatively easy to pick out through spotting scopes.

The flock occasionally spooked but returned to the same general area and we were able to relocate the stint after the group settled several times. For much of the time, the stint appeared to sleep with its bill tucked in and was sometimes hidden behind other birds. I attempted to digiscope the bird with the result seen here. Additional photos are here. All photos digiscoped with Panasonic DMC-LX5 | Nikon FieldScope III | 30XWA | hand-held (no adapter).

Description

The following description is based on memory and on photos:

A small Calidris shorebird perhaps a bit smaller than adjacent Western Sandpipers (C. mauri) but also seeming plumper and more dumpy in direct comparison. The bill was much shorter and appeared straight lacking the the slight kink near the end of the bill evident in the many Western Sandpipers. The most obvious distinguishing feature was the bright reddish upper chest and throat which extended unbroken up the cheeks to the side of the face. The crown was streaked with brown slightly suffused with rufous while the forehead and narrow supercilium appeared white with a slight buff tinge. The dark eye appeared small and a dark eyeline contrasted with a fairly long pale supercilium. The upperparts were mostly dark brown with a mixture of buff and white. The rest of the underparts appeared pure white and completely lacked any streaking on the breast, flanks or belly. Most of the Western Sandpipers were much more heavily streaked below with dusky. Just below the rufous upper chest, a narrow band of gray spotting was barely visible, but these spots did not penetrate into the red color. Legs and toes were short and black. It was not possible to determine toe webbing.

Identification

Stint identification can be tricky, but in full alternate (breeding) plumage, this species is relatively straightforward. Some duller Red-necked Stints can be confused with bright Little Stints. However Little Stint invariably has a pattern of heavy streaks inside the brightly colored area on the sides of the upper breast. More to the point is that breeding plumage Sanderling (C. alba) can be confused with Red-necked Stint. At one point a Sanderling landed directly in front of the stint. Its larger size was quite evident. Although its head pattern was somewhat similar, it was not nearly as bright as that of the stint and when it fluttered its wings, strong black wing coverts contrasted with a bold white wing stripe. The stint had a much narrower wing stripe with less contrast, not noticeably different from Western Sandpiper. Alternate plumage Spoon-billed Sandpiper (Calidris pygmea) is similar in plumage to Red-necked Stint, but it has a distinctive spatulate tip to its bill and has never been recorded in California.

Discussion

This is the first documented record for Alameda County. There are 17 previously accepted records of Red-necked Stint for California, all of adults in breeding plumage except for one juvenile photographed at Davis, Yolo County in Fall 2009. The preponderance of adults probably attests more to the difficulty of distinguishing this species in juvenal or basic plumage than to the true status of the species. Recently another adult was photographed 30 June 2016 at Estero Bluffs State Park, San Luis Obispo County. It has not yet been reviewed by the CBRC. .