Pied Avocet

Habitat: Pied Avocets are dependent on seawater and breed in saltwater lagoons, delta marshes, estuaries, mud flats, sandbanks, etc.

Appearance: In Europe mainly a summer visitor, in Belgium and the Netherlands fairly scarce to fairly numerous breeding bird – year bird – migrant – passage migrant and winter visitor in fairly small numbers.

Breeding season: May – July, ground nest – the nest is usually a modestly lined bowl in a salt marsh, meadow or beach vegetation. Both parents incubate, 4 eggs.

Characteristics: Length 42 – 46 cm, wingspan 77 – 80 cm, weight 260 – 290 grams, age 24 years.

Food: The upward-curved beak, narrow when viewed from the side but broad at the top, indicates that the Pied Avocet is a food specialist. It needs a brackish mud bottom, where certain small crustaceans develop in large numbers. However, he also hunts for food in muddy polder ditches. Hij then steps jerkily through the mud, which is covered by a very thin layer of water. With each step, it pulls its beak through the thin layer of liquid mud with a mowing motion, sifting out small food animals.