Grey-tailed Tattler

Tringa brevipes (Vieillot, 1816)

≈29 cmLength63 cmWingspan127 gWeight

This bird has gray upperparts, a white belly, short yellow legs and feet, and a two-syllable whistled call.

Most records: Australia, China, Japan

Looks like Wandering Tattler

Least Concern

How to identify

Field marks

Upperparts, face and neck gray; belly white
Legs and feet short and yellow
Bill pale at the base and dark at the tip
Wings and back gray and unmarked

Voice

A two-syllable whistle, rather noisy.

Similar species

Wandering Tattler

The two are difficult to separate; calls are the best distinction: Grey-tailed Tattler gives a two-syllable whistle, while Wandering Tattler gives an undulating trill.

Where and when it's recorded

Grey-tailed Tattler has been recorded at 516 of the 8,171 birding hotspots we track, in 37 countries and regions.

Records by month Northern Hemisphere

Where it's recorded most

Cairns EsplanadeAustralia3,785 records
St. Paul IslandUnited States1,484 records
Cairns Esplanade – Southern EndAustralia924 records

More places

Cairns Esplanade – Northern EndAustralia901 records
Long Reef Aquatic ReserveAustralia857 records
GambellUnited States706 records
Dapingding and Xucuogang IBA – XucuogangTaiwan (China)703 records
Hualien River Estuary IBATaiwan (China)620 records
Toorbul High Tide RoostAustralia595 records
Kinmen – Wujiang River EstuaryChina584 records

Countries and regions with the most records

Australia China Japan United States Philippines U.S. Outlying Islands Indonesia Guam

eBird records via GBIF up to 2024-12-31. A record means someone listed it; more records partly mean more birders, not more birds.

About

The grey-tailed tattler (Tringa brevipes), also known as the Siberian tattler or Polynesian tattler, is a small shorebird in the genus Tringa. The English name for the tattlers refers to their noisy call. The specific brevipes is from Latin brevis, "short", and pes, "foot".

Excerpt from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0 · authors · Read more on Wikipedia

Questions

How big is the Grey-tailed Tattler?

The Grey-tailed Tattler is about ≈29 cm long, with a wingspan of 63 cm and weighs around 127 g.

Where does the Grey-tailed Tattler live?

Its breeding range: Palearctic: (mainly) subarctic tundra of north-central, northeastern Palearctic: montane Krasnoyarsk (west-central Siberia) and Yana River to Anadyr Peninsula and Kamchatka (east-central, eastern Siberia). It is most often recorded in Australia, China and Japan.

Is the Grey-tailed Tattler endangered?

The IUCN Red List classifies the Grey-tailed Tattler as Least Concern.

What does the Grey-tailed Tattler eat?

Main food: Fish, shrimp & shellfish.

What family is the Grey-tailed Tattler in?

It belongs to the family Sandpipers, Snipes (Scolopacidae), order Charadriiformes.

At a glance

Length: ≈29 cm
Wingspan: 63 cm
Weight: 127 g
Habitat: Wetland
Diet: Fish, shrimp & shellfish
Lifestyle: Active on the ground
Migration: Migratory
Conservation: Least Concern

More measurements

Wing: 158 mm
Tail: 68 mm
Bill: 42 mm
Tarsus: 33 mm

Averages from the AVONET dataset; length from field guides where available.

Range

Palearctic: (mainly) subarctic tundra of north-central, northeastern Palearctic: montane Krasnoyarsk (west-central Siberia) and Yana River to Anadyr Peninsula and Kamchatka (east-central, eastern Siberia)

Breeding range, IOC World Bird List 15.2