{"id":7802,"date":"2026-04-14T17:09:11","date_gmt":"2026-04-14T16:09:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.butemuseum.org.uk\/butebirdgroup\/?p=7802"},"modified":"2026-04-21T16:38:29","modified_gmt":"2026-04-21T15:38:29","slug":"whimbrel-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.butemuseum.org.uk\/butebirdgroup\/whimbrel-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Whimbrel"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.butemuseum.org.uk\/butebirdgroup\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/04\/Whimbrel-1.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-7809\" src=\"https:\/\/www.butemuseum.org.uk\/butebirdgroup\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/04\/Whimbrel-1-300x225.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"225\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><em>Numenius phaeopus\u00a0<\/em>(Linnaeus, 1758)<br \/>\nFamily: Charadriiformes &gt;\u00a0Scolopacidae<\/p>\n<div class=\"grid | grid-2-cols\">\n<div class=\"col-1\/3 | col-reverse\"><\/div>\n<div class=\"col-2\/3\">\n<p>Whimbrel is a smaller version of the Curlew, with a shorter, straighter then down-curved bill and pale crown-stripe. The \u2018seven-whistle\u2019 call is diagnostic.<\/p>\n<p>This elegant wader has a very restricted UK breeding range, with a small population nesting mostly in Shetland. Birds start to arrive back on territory from the last week of April, having spent the winter in southern Europe and Africa.<\/p>\n<p>Birdwatchers are most likely to encounter Whimbrel in spring, as birds pass through Britain &amp; Ireland heading for their arctic breeding grounds, which stretch from Greenland to Siberia. Individuals or small flocks can be seen virtually anywhere around our coasts, and sometimes at inland locations in England.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>The Eurasian whimbrel is a fairly large wader, though mid-sized as a member of the curlew genus. It is 37\u201347 cm (15\u201319 in) in length, 75\u201390 cm (30\u201335 in) in wingspan, and 270\u2013493 g (9.5\u201317.4 oz; 0.595\u20131.087 lb) in weight. \u00a0It is mainly greyish brown, with a white back and rump (subspecies\u00a0<i>N. p. phaeopus<\/i>\u00a0and\u00a0<i>N. p. alboaxillaris<\/i>\u00a0only), and a long curved\u00a0beak\u00a0with a kink rather than a smooth curve. The usual\u00a0call is a rippling whistle, prolonged into a trill for the song. The only similar common species over most of this bird&#8217;s range are larger curlews. The whimbrel is smaller, has a shorter, decurved bill and has a central crown stripe and strong supercilia.<\/p>\n<div class=\"mw-heading mw-heading2\"><\/div>\n<p>This species feeds by probing soft mud for small invertebrates and by picking small crabs and similar prey off the surface. Before migration, berries become an important part of their diet. It has also been observed taking insects, specifically blue tiger butterflies.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Numenius phaeopus\u00a0(Linnaeus, 1758) Family: Charadriiformes &gt;\u00a0Scolopacidae Whimbrel is a smaller version of the Curlew, with a shorter, straighter then down-curved bill and pale crown-stripe. The \u2018seven-whistle\u2019 call is diagnostic. This elegant wader has a very restricted UK breeding range, with a small population nesting mostly in Shetland. Birds start to arrive back on territory from [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":30,"featured_media":7809,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[143,48,47],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7802","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-143","category-bird-species","category-migrant-arrivals"],"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.butemuseum.org.uk\/butebirdgroup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7802"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.butemuseum.org.uk\/butebirdgroup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.butemuseum.org.uk\/butebirdgroup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.butemuseum.org.uk\/butebirdgroup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/30"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.butemuseum.org.uk\/butebirdgroup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7802"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.butemuseum.org.uk\/butebirdgroup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7802\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7810,"href":"https:\/\/www.butemuseum.org.uk\/butebirdgroup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7802\/revisions\/7810"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.butemuseum.org.uk\/butebirdgroup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7809"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.butemuseum.org.uk\/butebirdgroup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7802"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.butemuseum.org.uk\/butebirdgroup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7802"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.butemuseum.org.uk\/butebirdgroup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7802"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}