Ruddy Turnstones

...back to the Captiva Island, Florida posts!

Everyday when I walked the beach, I'd find my little Ruddies somewhere along the way. They were nearly as busy as the Sanderlings running around and scrounging out food, but their style was a little different. Staying true to their name, Rick and I watched several "turn" over shells and "stones" to quickly nab the spiders and insects hiding underneath them...but just as often, we watched them run through the surf to grab mollusks and crustaceans from the tideline.

...you can never miss the orange, orange legs of a Ruddy Turnstone!

...can you see what he's doing here? He's digging a hole! In addition to turning over stones to find food, Ruddy Turnstones will dig holes to search out buried crustaceans.

...a Ruddy in winter plumage. I wonder if this little fellow has reached his breeding grounds in the Arctic yet?

A bird of the shoreline, you can always find Ruddy Turnstones running through the surf searching out sand fleas and coquinas.

...walking, searching...gotta keep moving...

...eating a coquina.

...although not a great photo, I love his athletic "running back" form...and the little coquina he's carrying in his bill!

Beak Bit

Our little Ruddy Turnstone is quite a flyer, winging his way over 16,700 miles (27,000 kilometers) on his roundtrip migration flight! In an article by Lewis Smith released in April of 2010 in "The Independent" (click here for the full article), researchers from the Australasian Wader Studies Group (AWSG) announced the amazing story of four Ruddy Turnstones' migration journey. Using new technology created by scientists at the British Antarctic Survey (BAS), the researchers at AWSG fitted tiny light-sensitive geotracking devices weighing only 1 gram to the Ruddies and waited for them to return. A year later, analysis of the data taken from the geolocators revealed it took the four birds just over six day to fly 4,700 miles from Flinders in South East Australia to Taiwan. While continuing on to their Arctic breeding grounds, one of the Ruddies flew 3,850 miles in just four days and 3,100 miles more in another four days (the birds averaged 31-34 mph). Wow...these birds don't mess around! I can't wait to see what this year's research brings, because the scientists fitted over 60 Ruddy Turnstones in April of 2010, so they should have a lot more research to report.

...and this bit is just cute...the tracker can be attached to the birds by either securing it to a leg or as a "backpack." All the Ruddies had to have them attached to their legs because tests showed that after spending the summer eating, eating, and eating to bulk up to their travel weight (190g), they were "round as tennis balls" and the backpacks wouldn't stay on!

....after I read this article, I looked to see if any others were out there, and found a lot. Here are a few more links:

Bird Life International, "A Ruddy Long Way to Fly"

American Birding Association, "Gods of the Gaps"

...the article I read, The Independent, "Not such a short hop: the tiny bird that soared into the record book"

New Results reported from the past year!

Mick, from the blog "Sandy Straits and Beyond" (out of S.E. Queensland, Australia) found the reports on the new data. Seems like the little fellow did it again!!! Here are links to two sites that report in detail about the Ruddy's second trip and the migration routes he chose:

Australasian Wader Studies Group (AWSG), "Ruddy hell: turnstone flies 27,000 kms--twice!" (This article has a photo of the bird wearing his little leg geolocator and a labeled graphic of the migration routes.)

Victorian Wader Study Group (VWSG), "What's new: Feb 5, 2011

...just another little FYI from these articles...Ruddy Turnstones are hardy little birds and live up to 20 years, so an Australian bird following the 27,000 km migration route would fly over 500,00 km in its lifetime! What an athlete...

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