Long-billed Dowitcher

Long-billed Dowitcher, breeding plumage, AK, June

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Long-billed Dowitcher, adult, nonbreeding (transitional) plumage

Long-billed Dowitcher, juvenile

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1. Cool Facts
2. Description
3. Similar Species
4. Sound
5. Range
6. Food
7. Behavior
8. Reproduction
9. Conservation Status
10. Other Names

A long-billed shorebird recognizable for both its distinctive profile and sewing machine-like feeding action, the Long-billed Dowitcher is most common west of the Mississippi.

Cool Facts

• Most Siberian breeding Long-billed Dowitchers likely migrate to the Americas during the winter.
• Although both sexes share incubation of the eggs, only the male takes care of the young once they hatch.

Description

• Size: 29 cm (11 in)
• Weight: 90-131 g (3.18-4.62 ounces)

• Medium-sized shorebird.
• Bill twice as long as head.
• Moderately long, pale legs.

• White wedge up back in flight.
• Tail barred black-and-white.
• Leans forward and probes into mud energetically with an action resembling a sewing machine.

Breeding (Alternate) Plumage: Underparts orange to rusty, extending from throat to undertail. Lines and bars on chest, sides, and flanks.
Nonbreeding (Basic) Plumage: Gray back, neck, and chest. Gray barring on flanks.

Sex Differences

Sexes look alike, but female is slightly heavier and has longer bill.

Immature

Juvenal plumage with brownish gray chest and flanks, less spotting and barring than breeding adults. Back feathers dark centered with broad buffy edges, giving a slightly scaly appearance. Tertials dark grayish with narrow rusty edges.

Similar Species

• Wilson's Snipe has similar proportions, but has dark rump and tail and golden stripes down back.
• Stilt Sandpiper has longer legs, a shorter, slightly down-curved bill, and a white rump that does not extend up the back.
• Short-billed Dowitcher is extremely similar and difficult to distinguish in most plumages. Voice is best character to distinguish adults. Juvenile short-billed has tiger-striped tertials instead of plain gray ones.

Sound

Flight call a sharp "peep," or quick series of two to five notes, "pee-p-p-pep."

Range

Range Map

© 2004 Cornell Lab of Ornithology

About the map

Summer Range

Breeds in high arctic from western Northwest Territories westward to eastern Siberia.

Winter Range

Winters locally along both coasts from California and North Carolina southward to northern Central America, and in interior from southern California eastward to Texas and southward through Mexico

Food

Aquatic invertebrates and insects.

Behavior

Foraging

Probes deeply into soft substances to the depth of the bill, sometimes submerging the head. Short jabbing and probing in distinctive "sewing machine" motion.

Reproduction

Nest Type

A deep depression in grass or moss, lined with grasses and small leaves. Often damp at bottom.

Egg Description

Light olive-greenish or bluish with brown spotting, denser at the large end.

Condition at Hatching

Downy chicks able to walk immediately, leave nest when all are hatched. Not fed by parents.

Conservation Status

Populations seem to be stable or increasing.

Other Names

Bécassin à long bec (French)
Costurero pico largo (Spanish)

Sources used to construct this page:

Takekawa, J. Y., and N. Warnock. 2000. Long-billed Dowitcher (Limnodromus scolopaceus). In The Birds of North America, No. 493 (A. Poole and F. Gill, eds.). The Birds of North America, Inc., Philadelphia, PA.