The least sandpiper (Calidris minutilla) is the smallest of the small sandpipers – not much bigger than a sparrow – and is the smallest shorebird in the world. It has distinctive yellow-green legs and a high-pitched creep call. It breeds throughout much of the northern reaches of North America. Eastern populations can fly nonstop over the ocean from the Gulf of St. Lawrence and New England to wintering grounds in northeastern South America, a distance of about 1,800 to 2,500 miles.
