Buff-breasted Sandpiper Habitat Model
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Draft Date:
May 2002

Species:
Buff-breasted sandpiper, Tryngites subruficollis

Use of Study Area Resources:
Migration. Buff-breasted sandpipers breed along the Arctic coast of Alaska and central Canada (Johnsgard 1981, Lanctot and Laredo 1994), and winter in southern South America. In the Fall most birds pass over the Mississippi River valley, but some juveniles migrate through the study area (Veit and Petersen 1993). Major food items are spiders, insects, seeds, and crustaceans (Johnsgard 1981, Lanctot and Laredo 1994).

Habitat Requirements:
Buff-breasted sandpipers frequent primarily uplands: "...short-grass areas such as pastures, golf courses, cemeteries, airports, and lawns" (Campbell and Gregory 1976, Paulson 1993, J. Strauch, D. Dekker, pers. comm., all in Lanctot and Laredo 1994), or cut agricultural fields (Sutton 1960 in Lanctot and Laredo 1994, Johnsgard 1981). They occasionally use the margins of tidal flats, lakes or lagoons (Hayman et al. 1986, Veit and Petersen 1993).

Model:
Sites with known buff-breasted sandpiper occurrences were scored higher than areas having appropriate cover types but without observation data. We used abundance/occurrence information from a Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife (MDIFW) shorebird coverage and the Manomet Bird Observatory's International Shorebird Survey (ISS) database for Maine, Massachusetts and New Hampshire. This occurrence information was used to select the general localities (polygons or buffers around observation points) used by the species. Environmental data sets (bathymetry and wetland cover type) were used to identify areas within those localities likely to have been used. The ISS data specified the observation locations only to the nearest geographic minute. Therefore, all suitable cover types (see table, below) within the MDIFW polygons or within a 1 km radius of the point data were regarded as having the respective levels of use for that observation.   

NWI Designations (wetlands only)	Cover Types	Cover Suitability (0 - 1 scale)
	Upland deciduous forest
	Upland coniferous forest
	Upland mixed forest
	Grassland	1.0**
	Upland scrub/shrub
	Cultivated
	Developed
	Bare ground
PEM, L2EM	Lake/pond, emergent vegetation
PFOcon	Palustrine forest, conifer
PFOdec	Palustrine forest, deciduous
PSSdec	Palustrine scrub shrub, deciduous
PSScon	Palustrine scrub shrub, conifer
PAB, L2AB	Lake/pond, aquatic vegetation
L1UB, PUB	Lake/pond, unconsolidated bottom
L2US	Lake, unconsolidated shore	0.5
L2RS	Lake, rocky shore
R1UB	Riverine subtidal unconsolidated
Rper	Riverine perennial
E1AB	Estuarine subtidal vegetated
E1UB	Estuarine subtidal unconsolidated bottom
E2AB	Estuarine intertidal algae
E2EM	Estuarine intertidal emergent
E2RS, R1RS	Estuarine, tidal river rocky shore
E2SS	Estuarine intertidal shrub
E2US, R1US	Estuarine, riverine intertidal unconsolidated shore	0.5*
M1AB	Marine subtidal vegetated
M1UB	Marine subtidal unconsolidated bottom
M2AB	Marine intertidal algae
M2RS	Marine intertidal rocky shore
M2US	Marine intertidal unconsolidated shore	0.5*
NOTES	* upper intertidal only ** patches of 1 ha or larger

Habitat Suitability Scoring: Suitable landcover types (see table) at sites having buff-breasted sandpipers were scored according to their level of use. If 5 or more birds were observed at any time, the landcover scores in the table were used; otherwise, if 1 to 4 birds were present, the landcover values were reduced by half.

Suitable cover types outside of the observation/occurrence polygons were scored 0.3 for grasslands and 0.1 for coastal sites.

Sources:

Hayman, P., J. Marchant and T. Prater. 1986. Shorebirds, an Identification Guide. Houghton Mifflin Co., Boston, MA. 412 p.

Johnsgard, P.A. 1981. The Plovers, Sandpipers and Snipes of the World. University of Nebraska Press. Lincoln. 493 pp.

Lanctot, R.B. and C.D. Laredo. 1994. Buff-breasted sandpiper (Tryngites subruficollis). In A. Poole and F. Gill (eds.) The Birds of North America, No. 91. The Birds of North America, Inc. Philadelphia, PA.

Veit, R.R. and W.R. Petersen. 1993. Birds of Massachusetts. Massachusetts Audubon Society. 514 p.