Tibetan sand plover or Greater sand plover? Location: Khor Al Beida, UAQ, UAE (1 Viewer)

[VS97]

Hi all. I'm a bit confused with this bird I captured on Christmas day 2023 at Khor Al Beida, UAE. I'm leaning towards Tibetan since the bill doesn't appear large enough relative to the head, for a Greater. The lack of a 'bulky' giss also leads me to think Tibetan.
Thanks in advance.

 

[Butty]

Bill looks greater sand plover to me.

 

[johnallcock]

An interesting bird and some very useful photos.
Everything about the plumage says Tibetan SP - long, white supercilium, large white forehead patch badly defined on the upper edge, pale lores, ear coverts similar in colour to crown, rounded breast patches, completely white flanks. The legs are very dark, the head is rounded and bird doesn't look particularly bulky.

But the bill looks really big for Tibetan, similar in length to Greater (as suggested by Butty). Despite this, the bill is fairly blunt-tipped and doesn't have the swollen nail that you often see on Greater (although columbinus often seems not to show this).

Overall, taking all features into account, I would say this is a Tibetan with a large bill.

Interesting that there are so many sand plover threads on the forum at the moment!

 

[VS97]

An interesting bird and some very useful photos.
Everything about the plumage says Tibetan SP - long, white supercilium, large white forehead patch badly defined on the upper edge, pale lores, ear coverts similar in colour to crown, rounded breast patches, completely white flanks. The legs are very dark, the head is rounded and bird doesn't look particularly bulky.

But the bill looks really big for Tibetan, similar in length to Greater (as suggested by Butty). Despite this, the bill is fairly blunt-tipped and doesn't have the swollen nail that you often see on Greater (although columbinus often seems not to show this).

Overall, taking all features into account, I would say this is a Tibetan with a large bill.

Interesting that there are so many sand plover threads on the forum at the moment!

Thanks for the detailed analysis. I'm happy to go with that ID! In the future, it might be worth considering to try and note the bird's size with respect to birds of a different species, preferably another sand plover.