The common sandpiper (Actitis hypoleucos)

 IDENTIFICATION

19-22 cm. Upperparts brown olive, including rump and tail; white underparts, with streaked breast; wings with a white band; dark bill and greenish legs.

SIMILAR SPECIES

Recalls a Green Sandpiper, which is bigger, with a white rump and lacks a white line on wing.

SEXING

Plumage of both sexes alike.

AGEING

3 types of age can be recognized:

Juvenile with feathers on upperparts, scapulars, and tertials with a narrow and rounded sub terminal bar bordered by buff at the tip, without streaks; wing coverts very heavily barred brown; central tail feathers without short bars or spots at sides; with fresh flight feathers and always with one age; some birds with legs tinged pink. 2nd year only if some juvenile feathers have been retained on median wing coverts, tail, or flight feathers.

Adult with feathers on upperparts with a dark streak; tertials streaked; wing coverts with a dark subterminal bar, sometimes with several spaced dark bars; central tail feathers with dark subterminal bar and short bars or spots at sides; flight feathers with two ages and, if only one, with eroded feathers; with grey greenish legs.

MOULT

Complete post breeding moult, starting in breeding areas and finished in wintering quarters. Partial post-juvenile moult but some birds can retain median wing coverts and flight and tail feathers; usually starting in wintering quarters. Both types of age have a pre-breeding moult, between February and May, including most of the body feathers and some wing coverts; sometimes also the tail.

STATUS IN ARAGON

This is a summer visitor breeding in rivers in mountainous areas, and widely distributed on passage in wet places throughout the Region.