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Red knots are medium-sized shorebirds with epic migrations that take them from their high Arctic breeding grounds to South American beaches. They pass through Southern California during a few weeks in spring and again in late summer and fall, but a few spend the winter. The birds on this page -- photographed in April at the Salton Sea and Bolsa Chica wetlands, both in southern California -- are in various stages of transition between the gray winter plumage and the bright rusty-bellied breeding plumage. One photo shows a knot with a breeding-plumage short-billed dowitcher (another plump shorebird with a rusty underside). Some red knots also winter in Australia, along with their larger relative the great knot. |
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