This put up is about Dunlins, as seen in and round Shanghai within the autumn of 2024 – the same old mixture of pictures and a few details which I steadfastly refuse to name “enjoyable details”. Whereas Dunlins are presumably not a species that will get the heartbeat of birders racing, I had two motivations to work on this put up. One was that I took some first rate pictures of Dunlins not too long ago – you will see them sprinkled all through this put up (“some sprinkle stuff”, JD Vance shopping for donuts). The opposite was a paper I encountered with the intriguing title “Particular person Associations in a Wintering Shorebird Inhabitants: Do Dunlin Have Mates?”
Mates?
The very first thing I discovered from that paper – which I checked individually – is that the plural of Dunlin is certainly both Dunlin or Dunlins – each appear to be right. Fascinating, isn’t it not?
However sure, the query raised within the paper is intriguing. So, the researchers radio-marked Dunlins wintering at Humboldt Bay, California and checked how often two Dunlins roosted collectively or a minimum of had been a part of the identical flock. The end result, in layman’s phrases, sadly, is that Dunlins don’t have associates. Which scientifically sounds as follows: “Our findings are in step with predictions for a extremely cell, usually nonterritorial, long-distance migrant for which steady social associations don’t have any clear profit.”
(This jogs my memory of how as soon as when doing a postdoc at Berkeley, I discussed taking a bus house after enjoying soccer with some associates, one supplied to drive me house, explaining “Should you take a bus, it means you haven’t any associates”).
Again to our Dunlins, which regardless of not having associates not often take buses. Some extra semi-scientific info, sadly not all as relatable because the above.
One would suppose that when feeding, Dunlins favor these spots with the best density of prey. Certainly, that is the case for these people feeding by sight – however that’s solely a minority. Many of the Dunlins examined in a paper fed utilizing contact to find prey within the softest mud. As a consequence, they like areas with softer mud, which is extra simply penetrated by their invoice, making the prey simpler to catch. So, “wetter is best” appears to be their rule of thumb when trying to find meals. A bit like trying to find your misplaced keys the place the sunshine is sweet, not the place you probably misplaced them.
One other paper – by the way researched at Chongming, Dongtan, additionally a part of Shanghai – ranked broader areas by Dunlin choice. Tidal mudflats are greatest adopted by aquaculture ponds, whereas agricultural croplands get a really low ranking by Dunlin influencers.
Worse than agricultural croplands are agricultural croplands containing wheat seeds handled with strychnine. 36 Dunlins died of strychnine poisoning in Yolo County, California in 1990 (supply).
It appears the identify Dunlin itself is a little bit of an insult. Based on Allaboutbirds, “The identify Dunlin comes from Dunling, the earliest identified English identify of the species, which dates again a minimum of so far as 1531. Dunling is a compound of the English phrase dun (that means grey-brown) and the diminutive -ling. So the identify Dunlin basically means ‘little brown job’.”
Or to place it in a really lame joke: “Who put the Duh in Dunlin?”
Regardless of this underappreciation, many Dunlins are nonetheless very able to having fun with their lives, as the subsequent picture exhibits (I’m penning this with the data that I should lookup the spelling of the phrase “anthropomorphizing” proper afterward).
Lastly, researchers filmed flying flocks of Dunlins and recognized two major maneuvers. One is a course-change motion wherein your complete flock alters its course, and the opposite a rotation motion wherein particular person birds rotate on their axes with out essentially altering course. Each could make a flock’s general look shift all of a sudden from gentle to darkish because the birds orient completely different components of their plumage towards the observer.
And the way lengthy does this take? On common, 196 milliseconds. With such a quick life-style, it isn’t stunning they don’t have associates.
