Seven species that share almost nothing except a place in the same eBird bucket. Black-winged Stilt and Pied Avocet are elegant black-and-white waders of open shallow water, both instantly recognisable and both easy — they wade in loose groups on any decent wetland and tolerate a reasonable approach. The three thick-knees are the opposite in every way: large-eyed, cryptically marked, mostly nocturnal, and built to freeze rather than move when something gets close. Ibisbill sits alone in its own family, a Himalayan river specialist unlike anything else in this group or in India.
The stilt is the easiest bird on this page and it shows: found on almost any wetland in the country, often in numbers, wading on legs so disproportionately long they look assembled from spare parts, and just as often seen lifting off a flat in a loose mixed flock as standing still. The avocet is worth a second look for the bill alone — strongly upcurved, swept from side to side just under the surface to feel for small invertebrates, which is a genuinely odd way for a bird to feed and is usually visible in the field even before the rest of the pattern registers.
The thick-knees are the hard birds in this group, and both species here prove the point in their own way. Indian Thick-knee turns up on dry scrub and waste ground near villages and is usually found under low cover in daylight, sitting still enough to be walked past; Great Thick-knee works open sand and mudflats at the water's edge and relies on the same stillness in the open rather than in cover. A thick-knee that has frozen, trusting its pattern to hide it, is one of the easier photographs in Indian birding if you can find it in the first place.
7Species in India
5Photographed
Open shallow waterStilts and avocets
Sand, scrub, stillnessThick-knees
Orange bill, pink legsOystercatcher
The species
Great Thick-knee
Esacus recurvirostris1 frame
Status
Resident
Range
Along major rivers and the coast, more local than Indian Thick-knee
Habitat
Sandbars, shingle banks and open mudflats near water
IUCN
Near Threatened
Large and heavy-billed for a thick-knee, with a massive black-tipped yellow bill built for crushing crabs and molluscs rather than picking at insects. Pale sandy-grey overall with a bold black-and-white wing bar and a big yellow eye. Tied closely to open sand and shingle rather than to scrub, which separates its habitat cleanly from Indian Thick-knee even where their ranges overlap.
FM0042
Jan 2021Pulicat Lake, Thiruvallur, Tamil NaduOn open sand at the water's edge, with a heron out of focus behind it.
Widespread across the drier parts of the subcontinent
Habitat
Dry scrub, waste ground, riverbeds and open country near villages, generally away from water
IUCN
Least Concern
Smaller and more streaked than Great Thick-knee, with a shorter bill and the same oversized yellow eye that marks the whole family. Almost entirely nocturnal, spending the day standing motionless under low cover — a shaded thorn bush, a patch of long grass — and found more often by voice at dusk than by sight during the day.
FM0043
Sep 2017Ibrahim Cheruvu, Ranga Reddy, TelanganaLow under acacia cover, the usual daytime hiding place.
Black-winged Stilt
Himantopus himantopus4 frames
Status
Resident and winter visitor
Range
Throughout the subcontinent on almost any wetland
Habitat
Shallow fresh and brackish water — tanks, marshes, flooded fields, tidal flats
IUCN
Least Concern
White body, black wings, and the longest legs relative to body size of any Indian bird, pink to deep red depending on the individual. The amount of black on the head and hindneck varies a great deal — some birds show a clean white head, others a dark cap and nape — and this variation alone is not a reliable indicator of age or sex. Highly gregarious, often seen wading, feeding, or lifting off in loose mixed flocks with other waders.
FM0044
Jan 2016Osman Sagar, Hyderabad, TelanganaThree birds on a rock at the water's edge, one calling.
Pied Avocet
Recurvirostra avosetta1 frame
Status
Resident and winter visitor
Range
Widespread across the subcontinent on suitable wetlands, more numerous in winter
Habitat
Shallow saline and brackish water, saltpans, large jheels and tidal flats
IUCN
Least Concern
Clean white body with bold black cap, black scapular stripes and black wing markings, on long pale blue-grey legs. The bill is the identifying feature: black, thin and strongly upturned, swept side to side through shallow water and mud in a scything motion to find small invertebrates rather than probed downward like most waders. Usually in loose flocks, often mixed with stilts.
FM0048
Nov 2018 · 500mm · 1/3200 · f/7.1 · ISO 400Tal Chhapar Sanctuary, Churu, RajasthanFour birds together, feeding, with an unidentified wader standing among them.
Coastal India, most regularly the Gujarat coast and other major estuaries and lagoons such as Pulicat Lake
Habitat
Sandy and muddy coastal flats, estuaries, tidal creeks and lagoon shorelines
IUCN
Near Threatened
A large, unmistakable shorebird — black above, white below, with a long straight orange-red bill and pink legs. In flight it shows a bold white wing bar and a black band across the white tail, visible a long way off. It forages by probing wet sand and picking at the shoreline, usually alone or in small numbers even where it turns up among large tern or gull roosts.
FM0049
Jun 2021Pulicat Lake, Thiruvallur, Tamil NaduA pair in flight, Pulicat Lake, Tamil Nadu — January 2021.
