Wintering sites and habitat use at stopover sites of Little Ringed Plover Thinornis dubius breeding in the Netherlands

We used geolocators recording ambient light, conductivity and wet/dry conditions to study the migration of Little Ringed Plovers Thinornis dubius breeding in the Netherlands. Little Ringed Plovers breeding in western Europe mostly migrate in the autumn towards the inner Niger delta in western Africa, mainly using stopover sites around the Mediterranean Sea. Conductivity data indicate that these autumn stopover sites are saline or brackish habitats, suggesting that saline coastal marshes or manmade saline aquatic habitats (saltworks) are important stopover habitats for Little Ringed Plovers. The timing of the spring migration coincides with the spring equinox (preventing accurate geolocator fixes); therefore we could not locate stopover sites in spring. However, we were able to use the conductivity data to infer the timing of the spring stopover sites and migration. We found that migrating Little Ringed Plovers spent 15% (females) or 17% (males) of their time in saline aquatic habitats.