A cheeky little wader, running up and down the beach, cheating the waves
Personally, I’d say it was a bit too cold to be toe-dipping in the sea – but not for this little Sanderling!
We were wandering along the beach at Bracklesham this afternoon when this little Sanderling came sprinting in our direction. He was pretty oblivious of us and if we hadn’t moved out of the way I think he would have run right under our feet!
Sanderlings are winter visitors to the UK. You’ll see them on sandy beaches, running up and down the shoreline as fast as their tiny little feet will carry them. But not only are they great on their feet, they’re also right up there when it comes to flying. They breed in the Arctic but check this – in the winter they’ve been recorded 16,000km south of their summer breeding grounds. That’s an impressive 32,000km round trip, long haul flight in search of some winter sunshine.
According to Wikipedia the name Sanderling comes from the Old English words ‘sand-yrðling’ or ‘sand-ploughman’.
There you go. I bet you never knew that a yrðling was a ploughman…
