Rare and local
breeding resident bird found in beaches, lagoons, estuaries, sandbanks and
coral reefs on the north and north-western coast. Occasionally found in other
dry coastal areas. It lives in solitary, in pairs or as small flocks. Its main
food consists of crabs and probably other small marine animals such as
sand-worms and molluscs captures while wading or waking along tide-marks of the seashore
or in the shallow water of lagoons. The breeding season is from May to June and it dig a
tunnel of 2-4 feet long into sand bank beside a beach and at the end hollow out
a small chamber in which it lays a single egg.
