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Upland sandpipers (formerly called upland plovers), and their plaintive whistling calls, are trademarks of spring in grassy fields east of the Rocky Mountains. Like many shorebirds they undertake very long migrations, wintering in southern South America. Perching on fence posts -- as these birds are doing -- is a characteristic behavior, as is their habit of carefully folding their wings in a striking three-step display after landing. The conservationist and writer Aldo Leopold was much taken by these elegant birds, and wrote in Sand County Almanac that "Whoever invented the word 'grace' must have seen the wing-folding of the plover." I photographed most of these birds on the Konza Prairie near Manhattan, Kansas; some were taken out of the window of a car driven by my patient friend Dave Rintoul, one picture was taken in northeastern Montana. |
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