Field Note: "Countermeasures"
Published: May 16, 2025
By Mark Seth Lender
Dunlin in synchronous flight (Photo: © Mark Seth Lender)
Living on Earth's Explorer-in-Residence, Mark Seth Lender, shares observations about shorebirds in flight.
Parker River National Wildlife Refuge is a stopover for thousands of migrating birds. Fall is a little easier them on than Spring as fish and crustaceans have had their hatchings. Grasses have gone to seed. There are still many insects. The birds eat and rest, packing in calories as fast as they can. Calories they cannot spend on a whim. The flight displays we find beautiful they find costly. And places like Parker River are an ever-diminishing few.
Synchronous flight is a beautiful thing. Of which dunlin have no conception. No more than pedestrians on a crowded sidewalk in the morning rush, jostling and juggling to get there on time consider their aesthetic from afar or above. Even with perspective I could not follow the paths of individual birds. Which is the point.
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