Stats

Lifespan

10-11 yrs

Size

Medium

Diet

Insectivore

Activity

Cathemeral

Social

Pair

Biome

Temperate grassland

Range

North America

Movement

Running

Breeding

Egg-laying

Defense

Camouflage

Status

Near Threatened

About

A loud, long-tailed plover of open ground across the Americas, named for its piercing kill-deer call. When a predator nears its nest, the killdeer feigns a broken wing, dragging it along the ground to lure the threat away from its eggs.

Life cycle

1. 1.
   egg

   A clutch of eggs is incubated in the nest, kept warm by a brooding parent until the chicks pip free.
2. 2.
   hatchling

   A naked or downy hatchling is fed in the nest by its parents.
3. 3.
   juvenile

   A feathered juvenile fledges from the nest and learns to fly and forage.
4. 4.
   adult

   Fully grown with adult plumage.

Learn more

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Taxonomy

Kingdom

Animalia

Phylum

Chordata

Class

Aves

Order

Charadriiformes

Family

Charadriidae

Genus

Charadrius

Species

Charadrius vociferus