WHEN former British prime minister Neville Chamberlain once claimed to have seen (and heard) a common sandpiper in winter, he was probably disbelieved by many fellow-ornithologists of the late-1930s.
After all, the species is typically a summer species, so why would one want to brave our wintry weather alongside the lake in St James' Park, London - the location, just a short walk from 10 Downing Street, of Chamberlain's bird.
Fast forward to 1976 when it was reckoned that some 100 birds had wintered in southern counties. So perhaps, after all, the PM's identification was accurate.
The figure of 100 is noted in a superb book, Common & Spotted Sandpipers, by Phil Holland, a gifted writer and expert on both species, who reckons a typical winter habitat is "a few kilometres up a tidal river where they lurk under banks".
Significantly, he has first-hand experience as he describes thus: "During a vey cold spell of weather on a day with a bitter north wind but a clear sky, I watched one at high tide that was on the south-facing bank snuggled in dry grass.
"When it flew off to feed as the tide went down, the depression it left was warm to touch.
"They have no competition for birds as they are usually the only shorebirds there.
"Their peck-rate suggests they get food reasonably easily."
Peck-rate?! There's an unusual concept.
Yet such is the intensity of Holland's research and his attention to detail that he is able to quote a statistic - 3,638 pecks per day - about a spotted sandpiper seen feeding in Yellowstone.
This authoritative and entertainingly-written study is full of such insights. Anyone who reads it will never think the same way about sandpipers again.
He has even unearthed an unlikely instance (in Zimbabwe) of a sandpiper being "attacked" by a willow warbler!
The book covers every angle - feeding, breeding, migration, distribution, habitat, predation, impact of global warming and recreational threats.
Happily, common sandpipers are still relatively common in Britain during summer - either as breeding residents or as passage migrants - but this may not be the case in years to come.
Suburbanisation and other human pressures eating away at traditional breeding habitat in Britain, while development in West and central Africa is eroding their main winter homelands.
Holland dedicates Common & Spotted Sandpipers to the late Derek Yalden, who contributed much of the field research data, and his wife, Pat.
The book is published by Scottish firm Whittles Publishing Ltd which has built up an impressive portfolio of ornithological and natural history titles.
https://www.whittlespublishing.com
The recommended retail price is £18.99, but, until April 12, there is a 20 per cent discount by inserting the code WPLINCS20 at the online checkout.
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