Spoon-billed Sandpiper
Beach bucket rotor ( Eurynorhynchus pygmeus )
The spoon beach runners ( Eurynorhynchus pygmeus ) is a small shorebird. The name derives from the front end noticeably broadened beak, which can be found as in any other wader and only a few other birds. The long-distance migrant is found on the Pacific coast in eastern Asia and eastern Russia.
Description
The spoon beach runner reaches a body length of 14 to 16 centimeters. The wingspan is 36 to 40 centimeters. The weight varies between 20 and 35 grams.
The head, neck and chest of the adult birds are reddish brown with dark brown stripes. The underside is blackish with pale brown and light cinnamon-colored seams. In Plain dress lacks the reddish color, the feathers of the pale brown gray top are lined up to the whitish wing-coverts. The underside is white.
Dissemination and lifestyle
Spoon beak beach runners breed in the tundra on the floor, on the train and in the winter they rest on mud flats along the ocean. The spoon-shaped beak is not used for Be, but for picking larger insects from the water surface and poking around in sandy- muddy substrate.
The breeding areas of the beach bucket rotor located on the Chukchi Peninsula and south along the isthmus of Kamchatka. The spoon beach runner breeds here exclusively in spits of land with sparse dwarf shrub tundra bordering estuaries with tidal flats. With one exception, all breeding sites are located more than five kilometers from the sea. Probably be breeding area was limited in the past on this region and the spoon beach runners never particularly common.
Beach bucket rotor drag along the Pacific coast of Japan, North Korea, South Korea and China in the wintering areas in South and Southeast Asia. There is evidence of winter spoon beach runners from India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Thailand, Vietnam, the Philippines, the Malay Peninsula and Singapore.
The spoon beach runner is facing extinction; his stock is rapidly declining. Should it be in 2009 have given 120 to 220 breeding pairs, currently (as of 2012) it is assumed that no more than 100 breeding pairs live. Especially habitat loss along the migration route is a major problem It has already been dammed partly as one of the main areas along the migration route at Saemangeum in South Korea, more areas will follow.
Important areas in which to hibernate spoon beach runner or rest on the train, are Yangcheng in China, the May Po - land in Hong Kong, the Red River Delta ( Xuan Thuy Nature Reserve ) in Vietnam, the inner Gulf of Thailand as well as point Calimere and the Chilka Lake in India.