Grey Plover

The grey plover is a large, sturdy plover with a short, thick black bill, a big dark eye and black legs. In winter plumage it is silvery grey finely speckled with white and black; in breeding plumage it turns jet black on the belly and breast. It feeds in a stop-and-go rhythm: a few steps, a pause to look, then a peck into the mud for a worm or small crustacean. It breeds far away on the Arctic tundra of Siberia, one of the most distant destinations of our wintering birds. In the Vendée it is seen mainly from autumn to spring, on the mudflats and beaches of the coast.