The little ringed plover (''Charadrius dubius'') is a small

plover Plovers ( , ) are members of a widely distributed group of wader, wading birds of subfamily Charadriinae. The term "plover" applies to all the members of the subfamily, though only about half of them include it in their name. Species lis ...

. The genus name ''Charadrius'' is a

Late Latin Late Latin is the scholarly name for the form of Literary Latin of late antiquity.Roberts (1996), p. 537. English dictionary definitions of Late Latin date this period from the 3rd to 6th centuries CE, and continuing into the 7th century in ...

word for a yellowish bird mentioned in the fourth-century

Vulgate The Vulgate () is a late-4th-century Bible translations into Latin, Latin translation of the Bible. It is largely the work of Saint Jerome who, in 382, had been commissioned by Pope Damasus I to revise the Gospels used by the Diocese of ...

. It derives from

Ancient Greek Ancient Greek (, ; ) includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the classical antiquity, ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Greek ...

''kharadrios'' a bird found in river valleys (''kharadra'', "ravine"). The specific ''dubius'' is

Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

for doubtful, since Sonnerat, writing in 1776, thought this bird might be just a variant of

common ringed plover The common ringed plover or ringed plover (''Charadrius hiaticula'') is a species of bird in the family Charadriidae. It breeds across much of northern Eurasia, as well as Greenland. Taxonomy The common ringed plover was formally described i ...

Description

Adult little ringed plovers have a grey-brown back and wings, a white belly and a white breast with one black neckband. They have a brown cap, a white forehead, a black mask around the eyes with white above and a short dark bill. The legs are flesh-coloured and the toes are all webbed. This species differs from the larger

ringed plover The common ringed plover or ringed plover (''Charadrius hiaticula'') is a species of bird in the family Charadriidae. It breeds across much of northern Eurasia, as well as Greenland. Taxonomy The common ringed plover was Species description, f ...

in leg colour, the head pattern, and the presence of a clear yellow eye-ring.

Gallery

Flussregenpfeifer Charadrius dubius.jpg, Mating, the male bird hits the cloaca of the female bird Charadrius dubius curonicus MHNT.jpg, Egg of '' Charadrius dubius'', MHNT Little ringed plover - chick.jpg, Little ringed plover chick Juvenile little ringed plover.jpg, A juvenile at Pulicat Lake, India File:Little ringed plover - Fulzar Dam, Jamnagar 2021-11-14.jpg, At Fulzar Dam, Jamnagar Little ringed plover (Charadrius dubius) in padma river.jpg, At

Padma River The Padma () is a major river in Bangladesh. It is the eastern and main distributary of the Ganges, flowing generally southeast for to its confluence with the Meghna River, near the Bay of Bengal. The city of Rajshahi is situated on the banks ...

, Bangladesh File:Little Ringed Plover AMSM6848 LRPL.jpg, Adult in breeding plumage at

Khijadiya Bird Sanctuary Khijadiya Bird Sanctuary is a bird sanctuary located in Jamnagar district of Gujarat, India. About 300 species of migratory birds have been recorded here. In 2022, on World Wetlands Day (2 February) it was declared as a List of Ramsar sites in I ...

Gujarat Gujarat () is a States of India, state along the Western India, western coast of India. Its coastline of about is the longest in the country, most of which lies on the Kathiawar peninsula. Gujarat is the List of states and union territories ...

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

Little ringed plover (Charadrius dubius) in flight Malta.jpg, In Malta

Habitats and range

Their breeding habitat is open gravel areas near freshwater, including gravel pits, islands and river edges across the

Palearctic The Palearctic or Palaearctic is a biogeographic realm of the Earth, the largest of eight. Confined almost entirely to the Eastern Hemisphere, it stretches across Europe and Asia, north of the foothills of the Himalayas, and North Africa. Th ...

including northwestern

Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent after Asia. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 20% of Earth's land area and 6% of its total surfac ...

. They nest on the ground on stones with little or no plant growth. Both males and females take turns incubating the eggs. They are migratory and winter in

. These birds forage for food on muddy areas, usually by sight. They eat insects and worms.

Subspecies

Three subspecies recognized. *''C. d. curonicus'' J. F. Gmelin, 1789 - from Eurasia, Russian Fareast, Japan, Korea, China to North Africa. Winter spends in Sahara, Sri Lanka, to Indonesia and China. *''C. d. jerdoni'' (Legge, 1880) - from India, Sri Lanka, Pakistan to South East Asia. *''C. d. dubius'' Scopoli, 1786 - from the Philippines, New Guinea to Bismarck Archipelago.

Conservation

The little ringed plover is one of the species to which the ''Agreement on the Conservation of African-Eurasian Migratory Waterbirds'' (

AEWA The Agreement on the Conservation of African-Eurasian Migratory Waterbirds, or African-Eurasian Waterbird Agreement (AEWA), is an independent international treaty developed under the auspices of the United Nations Environment Programme's Convent ...

) applies.

References

External links

Little ringed plover
Images and documentation
Sexing and ageing (PDF; 5.4 MB) by Javier Blasco-Zumeta & Gerd-Michael Heinze
* * * * * * * * {{Authority control

little ringed plover The little ringed plover (''Charadrius dubius'') is a small plover. The genus name ''Charadrius'' is a Late Latin word for a yellowish bird mentioned in the fourth-century Vulgate. It derives from Ancient Greek ''kharadrios'' a bird found in river ...

Birds of Eurasia Birds of Africa

Taxa named by Giovanni Antonio Scopoli