Part of the plover clan
You know from the name that a plover has to be a cool bird. The name sounds neat and it’s a fun word to say. Unfortunately, we only have one plover that breeds in North Idaho, and if you go running to the index of your field guide looking for it, you won’t find it. Why? Well, our plover doesn’t have plover as a last name. So, you see, a plover by any other name would have to be a killdeer.
Even though our killdeer has but one name, it is still a very clever bird. It is one of the few, outside the parrots, that can say its own name. When agitated, it flies around screaming “kill-deer, kill-deer, kill-deer.” No, that’s not the feeding call of the native North Idaho redneck, and I really don’t think that the bird is making a personal statement on its wildlife management preferences. It is, in fact, the killdeer’s alarm and flight call, used both day and night, and it is only a small part of what has been described as a complex vocal inventory of this plover.
Historically, I found that the bird screamed the kill-deer phrase long before it was so named. It is a screamer, that’s not in doubt. The second half of its scientific name is “vociferus” (Latinized vociferous). Its previous name, back in 1785, was “noisy plover.” Adjectives in current field guides describe its call as loud, insistent, and piercing. Thus, this is a bird that has a conspicuous cry, no matter what it says.
Back in the 1800s, when shorebirds – and the killdeer is a type of shorebird – were regularly hunted, killdeer were more often shot for being annoying than for their edibility. And so distinctive is their call that it is one of the more common phrases that starlings choose to mimic.
Killdeer breed in 49 states and all Canadian provinces – several have been seen in Hawaii, but they were apparently not there on honeymoon – and in most of these places, they breed a lot. In the southern areas, at least, killdeer have multiple broods in a season, and in tropical areas, they produce broods all year long. If a nest is lost due to damage or predation, killdeer moms have been known to produce new eggs within days. They are always, it would seem, in the mood.
There is a good reason for such readiness. Killdeer are ground nesters. That doesn’t just mean that they nest on the ground, but also that their nest is the ground. As with penguins, killdeer like rocks for raising children. Also as with penguins, they prefer rocks somewhat near water. But unlike penguins, killdeer choose some pretty bizarre rocky places.
Killdeer like gravel, with very little regard as to where that gravel is located. It may be natural gravel, found in a field or on a sandy island in a river. Or, it may be human-generated gravel, such as on a flat, gravel roof, on a gravel driveway or parking lot, in the gravel between the rails of train tracks, on the gravel shoulder of a busy highway, or in the middle of a lesser-used gravel roadway.
The frequency of use of gravel in the latter two locations explains why killdeer suffer so from HBCD – hit-by-car disease. Killdeer are also not good at anticipating road graders along the highway shoulders they so often favor.
These nesting places are generally exposed to the elements, so to protect their nests from environmental dangers, killdeer have two peculiar habits. One is that every time a parent-to-be leaves the prospective nest site, the bird picks up a few rocks and tosses them over its shoulder. Yes, it’s for good luck; yes, birds do have shoulders. The lighter colored the rock, the more likely it will be tossed. So, with time, the nest comes to be situated on a miniature white mound. The elevation comes in handy if the area floods during a summer thunderstorm, and the whiteness may help keep it relatively cool.
The other odd killdeer behavior for protecting the nest is their practice, when it’s really hot, of soaking themselves in water, then standing over the eggs and dripping on them to cool them by evaporation. Killdeer don’t begin incubating their clutch until all eggs are there, so if it’s hot in the meantime, one of the pair will stand to shade the eggs, thereby preventing either spontaneous incubation, or fried eggs.
Killdeer are a member of the plover clan referred to as ringed plovers. In fact, they are double-ringed plovers, having two wide breast bands, except for a short period during chickhood when there is but one. In addition to their cool double-banded breasts, killdeer have sporty wings that are long, tapered, and have a white racing stripe. Killdeer also have a distinctive rufous rump that’s similar to the rump of a Wilson’s snipe. Otherwise, they are chocolate brown and milk white.
Killdeer rely on human activity for their feeding behavior, too. Farm pastures, plowed fields, athletic fields, airport lawns, and, especially, golf courses are prime foraging grounds. There they hunt such things as earthworms, many types of beetles, spiders, and grasshoppers. At sod farms they are known to be more effective than pesticides at eliminating sod webworms, a serious agricultural pest.
When the Rathdrum Prairie was still mostly grass fields, there was an experimental sod farm at the corner of highway 41 and Prairie Avenue. It’s now for sale. That has been one of the most predictable spots for seeing killdeer, especially early in the spring.
Killdeer may also hunt in shallow water where they stamp their feet for who-knows-what reason and eat aquatic worms and insects. They are also nighttime birds as much as they are daylight birds. Often I have heard the kill-deer call late into the summer night from above the field near my house. Here again man has helped them. Lighted playfields and parking lots have become prime killdeer feeding areas when the moon doesn’t give out much light.
Killdeer-type foraging is difficult in the cold of winter. In its southern range, the killdeer may not migrate, but in North Idaho, killdeer must leave for the winter. Despite this, a killdeer or two has been seen on a few Christmas bird counts – in five of 16 years in Coeur d’Alene and in eight of 36 years around Harrison. Just a hundred miles south, in North Idaho’s tropical zone around Lewiston, lots of killdeer are seen most winters – 83 on the December 2000 CBC, according to records kept by Shirley Sturts of Coeur d’Alene Audubon.
They are also one of the earliest migrants to return each spring, usually during the last week of February. In fact, over the past 30-some years, the average first-sighting date for the killdeer in Kootenai County is February 21 – this also from Sturts’ records. This year’s first area killdeer was found on February 26 – a little late due to the snow, no doubt. It either kept the killdeer away, or the birders in.
Despite many of the problems that killdeer share with other human-associated birds, this neat terrestrial shorebird is doing well throughout most of its range. In fact, it’s certainly the most widespread shorebird in the lower 48 states, and there are way more killdeer now than there were 250 years ago, thanks to its ability to adapt well to life with man. After all, look how fond we, as a species, are of gravel. Then you’ll understand the relationship between them and us as easily as you’ll understand the killdeer’s pronunciation of its own name.