Marsh sandpiper
Taking advantage of a month-long stay here in Amsterdam, I now add my first post with European birds. With amazing good luck, I immediately added several birds to my life list (if I had one), including a misplaced Marsh sandpiper (Tringa stagnatilis). This is a species normally found only in eastern Europe, where it breeds, or in southern Europe in winter. Local birders alerted me to the presence of the bird, a solitary specimen associating with Redshanks (Tringa totanus) and other waders on a mudflat (fresh water) just outside Durgerdam, a pretty village on the outskirts of Amsterdam. I certainly would not have been able to identify it unaided. It resembles a slender Greenshank (Tringa nebularia) I’m told. However, since no Greenshanks were present, I was unable to make that direct comparison. I now have a pair of Bushnell binoculars with a mounted camera (a lovely present from son, Richard) but I still cannot take photos because I need a card to make it work, it seems. I am now joining the modern age and hope to add my own photos of sightings as they occur in future. Here are two rather more common tringas by way of comparison.
Greenshank
Redshank
Birds for Beer 