 Mike Stiles
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Moonbird
by Mike Stiles
Mid to late summer
is shorebird season. As you read
this, birders are scouring
estuaries, creek mouths, and all
small bodies of water along both
coasts for shorebirds. In late
July of this year, birders have
found New Jersey's first ever
European Golden Plover and
Florida's first ever Red-necked
Stint. It does pay to keep an eye
out.
Most shorebirds now are in their
annual southbound trek to
wintering grounds. Locally, some
will winter on Morro Bay, but
others are in the midst of
impossible-sounding migrations.
I've written before about
shorebird migration here, but
this article is about an
individual bird that has been
dubbed "Moonbird."
In 1995, on Tierra Del Fuego at
the extreme southern tip of South
America, a Red Knot was banded by
researchers and given a yellow leg
band numbered B95. It was
subsequently relocated on its
breeding grounds on South Hampton
Island, just south of the Arctic
Circle in northeastern Canada, a
distance of 9,000 miles away . . .
and just one leg of its yearly
journey.
B95
- "Moonbird" |
He was in adult plumage when first
banded, so was in his second year
at the time. This spring, almost
20 years later, B95 was seen at
one of its stopping points on the
Delaware Bay. That means that he
has flown at least 320,000 miles
in its lifetime, equivalent to a
trip to the moon and halfway back.
B95 and his kin
stop during their annual migration
on Delaware Bay, timed perfectly
to allow them to gorge on
Horseshoe Crab eggs. They arrive
famished and emaciated and will
spend a few weeks on the bay
eating the protein-rich diet to
fatten up and fuel the next leg of
their northbound migration.
Decades ago, when Red Knot
populations plummeted on the
Deleware from 100,000 to just
12,000 birds, due mostly to the
overharvesting of Horseshoe Crabs,
scientists became alarmed and
started the project that banded
Moonbird. Interestingly, the crabs
are inedible, but the eggs are
harvested for bait to catch other
fish. Recent conservation efforts
have helped raise this year's
count of Red Knots on Delaware Bay
to nearly 26,000 birds, the
highest count in ten years.
Moonbird, who now holds the
longevity record of any known Red
Knot, is famous. The bird has been
immortalized in a book “A Year on
the Wind with the Great Survivor
B95” by Phil Hoose, and even a
song, written by Hoose and Ray
Shuy.
Keep in mind that Moonbird's first
journey of 9,000 miles occurred
when he was just a few weeks old;
he was not following his parents since they migrate at
different times, and he was using
a guidance system that humans can
only hypothesize about. It is no wonder they call
Moonbird the "toughest 4 ounces on
the planet."
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