A Semipalmated plover is seen foraging for food on a beach in Las Lisas, Guatemala. The semipalmated plover (Charadrius semipalmatus) is a small plover. Their breeding habitat is open ground on beaches or flats across northern Canada and Alaska. They nest on the ground in an open area with little or no plant growth. They are migratory and winter in coastal areas of the southern United States, the Caribbean and much of South America. They are extremely rare vagrants to western Europe. Semipalmated plovers forage for food on beaches, tidal flats and fields, usually by sight. They eat insects such as the larvae of long-legged and beach flies, larvae of soldier flies and shore flies, mosquitoes, grasshoppers and Ochtebius beetles, spiders, crustaceans such as isopods, decapods and copepods, and worms such as polychaetes. They also consume small molluscs including bivalves and gastropods, including snails such as coffee bean snails and Odostomia laevigata. These opportunistic feeders also feed on berries or seeds from grasslands or cultivated fields. This bird resembles the killdeer but is much smaller and has only one band. Since the semipalmated plover nests on the ground, it uses a "broken-wing" display to lure intruders away from the nest, in a display similar to the related killdeer.
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