A sturdy, medium-sized shorebird with a heavy bill for a plover. It has fairly long legs, large eyes, and a rather large head.
Relative Size
Larger than a Semipalmated Plover, smaller than a Killdeer.


Measurements
- Both Sexes
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A sturdy, medium-sized shorebird with a heavy bill for a plover. It has fairly long legs, large eyes, and a rather large head.
Larger than a Semipalmated Plover, smaller than a Killdeer.
Ornithologists recognize four subspecies, which differ in head pattern, breast band, and color of upperparts. The subspecies wilsonia is the only one that breeds in the United States; it also occurs south to Belize and into the Caribbean. The more rufous-tinted cinnamominus inhabits the southern Caribbean, while the heavy-billed crassirostris is resident in Brazil. Along Pacific shores from Mexico to Peru, beldingi is the breeding subspecies, similar to cinnamominus but with a different head pattern and broader breast band.
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