Oystercatchers | Haematopodidae

Scholeksters | Ostreros

A long, heavy, laterally flattened orange-red bill is the tool of this family: it is driven like a chisel between the shells of a bivalve or used like a hammer on the shell itself, and it wears down so fast in the work that it grows continuously. With it go short, sturdy legs with three toes, a red eye-ring, and a plumage that is either black and white or wholly black, alike in both sexes. Unlike almost all other waders, the chicks do not feed themselves: opening shellfish takes so much practice that the parents go on feeding them for months. The clutch is two or three eggs in a scrape, and the birds announce themselves in loud, piercing piping displays, small groups walking about with the neck drawn in and the bill pointed down.