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The Spoon-billed Sandpiper
(Eurinorhynchus pygmaeus.)
This little bird is one of the mysteries of bird-land. In size, colour and form it resembles a Red-throated Stint (an eastern form of the Little Stint which visits Britain on migration), except that its bill is spade-like at the tip. The nesting territory of the Spoon-billed Sandpiper is probably N.E. Asia and N.W. America, the bird ranging in winter to China and Burma. Concerning its feeding habits little is known, but we may guess from the shape of its bill that it lives on small aquatic animals or plants, which it obtains either in liquid mud or in shallow pools.