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Australian Wildlife

  Kentish Plover (Charadrius alexandrinus)





Kentish Plover | Charadrius alexandrinus photo
Kentish Plover

Image by Mike Baird - Some rights reserved.    (view image details)

Kentish Plover | Charadrius alexandrinus photo
Kentish Plover

Image by U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service - License: Public Domain.    (view image details)







KENTISH PLOVER FACTS

Description
The Kentish Plover is a small shorebird. The male breeding plumage is brown above with black bar on head, dark bands from the shoulder round part of the breast. breast, reddish brown on back of neck and head. The females are paler brown above and white below without the darker head and chest markings Both male and female birds have dark legs and black bill.

Size
14 cm length

Habitat
lake shores, wetlands, marshes, coastland, sand dunes, semi-arid desert, tundra

Food
insects, mollusks, crustaceans, spiders, worms

Breeding
the nest is small shallow scrape in the ground

Range
The Kentish Plover breeds in breeding areas covers Europe, Asia and Africa. It is a rare vagrant to Australia with only a few sightings on Christmas Island, Darwin and NSW.

distribution map showing range of Charadrius alexandrinus in Australia

Credits:
Map is from Atlas of Living Australia website at https://biocache.ala.org.au licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.



Classification
Class:Aves
Order:Charadriiformes
Family:Charadriidae
Genus:Charadrius
Species:alexandrinus
Common Name:Kentish Plover

Relatives in same Genus
  Inland Dotterel (C. australis)
  Double-banded Plover (C. bicinctus)
  Little Ringed Plover (C. dubius)
  Ringed Plover (C. hiaticula)
  Greater Sand Plover (C. leschenaultii)
  Lesser Sand Plover (C. mongolus)
  Red-capped Plover (C. ruficapillus)