American Avocet

Recurvirostra americana

Charadriiformes / Recurvirostridae · Western North America, wintering south · first seen August 2025 · 8 sightings

American Avocet in flight, banking low — Midsummer, soft overcast.

Adult American Avocet at close range — First light in September.

I keep running into american avocets in the same spots every year, and every year I think I’ve worked them out. I haven’t.

Structure is the best clue at distance: in flight the american avocet has a particular proportion you start to recognize before any field mark resolves.

I avoid published counts of population estimates here. My interest is a sightings journal, not a density map.

The best individual bird I’ve had was hunting in thin morning light, long enough for me to watch rather than shoot for once.

If I had to explain what pulled me into birding, I’d point at a american avocet and not try to say more.