Food Habits

Main Foods Taken

Aquatic and terrestrial invertebrates, particularly flies and beetles. Occasionally, small fish and seeds.

Microhabitat For Foraging

See Habitat, above. Forages in fresh, brackish, and salt water (including hypersaline) habitats. Also feeds in man-made and ephemeral wetlands, and occasionally on dry land. Generally found in tarsus-deep water but will forage up to belly and while swimming. The majority (73%) of individuals (n = 744) foraging in Alaskan salt marshes were in tarsus-deep water, fewer in foot- (15%), tibia- (10%), and belly-deep (3%) water (TLT unpubl.). Individuals foraged in 4–16 cm of water in Texas playas (Baldassarre and Fischer 1984) and, on average, in about 2.5 cm of water at diked wetlands in S. Carolina (Weber and Haig 1996). Mean (± SE) water depth for Lesser Yellowlegs (n = 13) using flooded impoundments in Missouri was 2.7 ± 0.5 cm and individuals generally stayed within 15 cm of the shore (Rundle and Fredrickson 1981).

Breeders in s. Alaska forage in salt-marsh ponds surrounded by sedges (e.g., Carex lyngbyaei, C. ramenskii), arrowgrass (Triglochin maritimum), and plantain (Plantago maritima), and in spruce bog pools edged with a variety of low shrubs (TLT). Along migratory routes and at wintering sites, individuals forage in many types of coastal and inland wetlands including mud shores of grassy lakes; short-grass marshes with shallow pools; mud flats; gravel and sand beaches; mats of floating vegetation on sewage lagoons and rivers; flooded agricultural fields; cut grain that has been left to dry in fields; mud puddles on roads; pastures; golf courses; brackish-water impoundments; and ephemeral, freshwater playas (Nichols and Harper 1916, Bent 1927, Myers and Myers 1979, Baldassarre and Fischer 1984, Amos 1991, Hicklin and Spaans 1993, Weber and Haig 1997, S. Holohan in litt., C. Siddle in litt., WM).

Food Capture And Consumption

Very active forager. Walks rapidly through shallow water and picks up prey on or below water surface with quick thrusts of bill (Fig. 2). Typically holds neck stretched forward and bill at a 20–30° angle from substrate (Street 1923, Rowan 1929). Occasionally probes in mud, snatches insects out of air, picks prey off vegetation, scythes bill back and forth just beneath surface of water or liquid mud (i.e., sidesweeping), or dashes after prey on land (Nichols and Harper 1916, McNeil and Robert 1988, Paulson 1993, TLT). Unusual report from Vancouver I., BC, of a bird skimming water surface for insects by running through shallow pond with beak open (Pearse 1968); this foraging technique performed more commonly by Greater Yellowlegs (Elphick and Tibbitts 1998). In Florida, a bird fed by walking parallel to foraging Black-necked Stilts (Himantopus mexicanus) and capturing small aquatic prey stirred up by them (Funderburg 1967). Similar behavior noted in Alaska involving Lesser Yellowlegs and Northern Shovelers (Anas clypeata); individuals followed closely behind feeding shovelers and picked up prey items in their wake (TLT). One observation of a Bahama Duck (A. bahamensis) that sought out and foraged behind Lesser Yellowlegs; both species used a sidesweeping technique (Raffaele 1975).

In Venezuela, foraged as often during day as at night (Robert et al. 1989); used visual foraging techniques (e.g., pecking) during day and tactile techniques (e.g., sidesweeping) at night (McNeil and Robert 1988). Fall migrants foraged for approximately 80% of day on intertidal flats in Virginia (WM) and 78% of day at sewage treatment ponds in the Northwest Territories (Young 1989).

Major Food Items

Diet diverse. See Skagen and Oman (1996) for list of 65 invertebrate families recorded in diet of Lesser Yellowlegs. Detailed and quantitative information on diet collected mostly at fall stopover sites as per following. The digestive tracts of 9 birds that fed at a shallow mud-bottom pond in Illinois contained snails (Physa sp.), mayfly naiads (Callibaetus fluctuans), damselfly naiads (Enallagma civile), dragonfly naiads (Epicordulia princeps, Erythemis simplicicollis, Plathemis lydia), midge flies (mostly larvae; Chironomus sp.), soldier fly larvae (Odontomyia sp.), predaceous diving beetles (mostly adults; Agabus disintegratus, Hygrotus sp.), water scavenger beetle adults and larvae (Berosus sp.), weevil adults (Sitona hispidula, S. cylindricollis) and water boatmen (Corixidae; Brooks 1967a, Brooks 1967b). In Puerto Rico, stomachs from 9 individuals contained 26.6% dytiscid larvae, 5.1% bloodworms, 5.0% planorbid snails, 3.1% hydrophilid adults, 1.8% hydrophilid larvae, 1.1% fleabeetles, 1.0% Notonectidae, 0.7% dytiscid adults, 0.55% lycosid spiders, 0.55% carabid beetles (Stenous sp.), 0.55% bupestrid beetle, 0.33% fish scales, 0.22% grasshoppers, and 3.2% other beetles (S. Danforth in Bent 1927). Esophagi of 5 migrants from Missouri contained 40% larval Ephemeroptera, 30% adult Coleoptera, 20% larval Coleoptera, and 10% larval Diptera (by volume; Rundle 1982). Contents of digestive tracts of 10 migrants on the Texas High Plains reported as 52% Corixidae, 15% larval Lepidoptera, 14% adult Coleoptera, 10% adult Diptera, 9% miscellaneous items, and 1% seeds (by volume; Baldassarre and Fischer 1984). Nine birds at Saint Lawrence River estuary, Québec, consumed crustaceans (Crangon septemspinosus, Gammarus spp.) almost exclusively and ingested crustacean eggs incidentally (Michaud and Ferron 1990).

Little information on diet of wintering birds, spring migrants, or breeders. Several (n = 6) wintering birds foraging in rice fields in Suriname consumed spiders (Oxyopidae: Oxyopes salticus, Salticidae, Lycosidae) and insects (Curculionidae, Carabidae, either Gryllotalpidae or Gryllidae, Hemiptera; Hicklin and Spaans 1993). In Argentina, a gastropod (Littoridina parchappei) was the most important prey item for 13 birds; less important were insects (Belostomatidae: Belostoma sp., Dytiscidae, Hydrophilidae: Tropisternus sp.), and fish (Beltzer 1991). A nereid polychaete (Laeonereis culveri) was the most numerous item in 5 of 7 digestive tracts from spring migrants at brackish diked wetlands in coastal S. Carolina; birds also took chironomids, ostracods, corixids, and snails (Weber and Haig 1997). Breeding birds (n = 32) commonly ate larval chironomids, tipulids, and dolichopodids at Fort Churchill, Manitoba (Baker 1977). Breeders at coastal and inland sites in s. Alaska ate a variety of insects, particularly adult and larval chironomids and ephydrids (TLT).

Although considered a generalist and opportunist, some evidence individuals select for prey type. In Illinois, for example, chose chironomids, corixids, baetids, and hydrophilids in higher proportions than expected, relative to availability (Brooks 1967a). In Texas, fed mostly on corixid adults although prey items taken commonly at other sites (e.g., chironomids) were abundant and available (Baldassarre and Fischer 1984).

No information.

No information.

Drinks fresh and brackish water by dipping bill in water and tipping head up slightly. Casts pellets during foraging bouts, while flying, while perched on treetops, and apparently while roosting (concentrations found at intertidal roost sites; Rowan 1929, TLT). In Alaska, casts pellets throughout summer and early fall when diet consists primar-ily of invertebrate larvae. Pellet-casting not yet recorded away from breeding grounds but likely to occur given overlap in diet across seasons.