Godwit

{{Short description|Genus of birds}} {{Use British English|date=May 2026}} {{Use dmy dates|date=May 2026}} {{For|the New Zealand publishing company|Godwit Press}} {{redirect|Limosa}} {{Automatic taxobox |fossil_range = Barstovian–recent<ref>{{cite web |title=Limosa Brisson 1760 (godwit) |url=https://paleobiodb.org/classic/checkTaxonInfo?taxon_no=210450&is_real_user=1 |publisher=PBDB}}</ref> | image = Limosa limosa.jpg | image_caption = Black-tailed (front) and bar-tailed godwit (back) | taxon = Limosa | type_species = ''Scolopax limosa'' | type_species_authority = Linnaeus, 1758 | authority = Brisson, 1760 | subdivision_ranks = Species | subdivision = 4, see text }}

'''Godwits ''' are a group of four large, long-billed, long-legged and strongly migratory waders of the bird genus '''''Limosa'''''. Their long bills allow them to probe deeply in the sand for aquatic worms and molluscs. In their winter range, they flock together where food is plentiful. They frequent tidal shorelines, breeding in northern climates in summer and migrating south in winter.

A female bar-tailed godwit made a flight of 29,000 km (18,000 mi), flying {{Convert|11680|km|mi|abbr=on}} of it without stopping.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Bird Completes Epic Flight Across the Pacific |website=ScienceDaily|agency=US Geological Survey |date=17 September 2007 |url= https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/09/070915131205.htm}}</ref> In 2020 a male bar-tailed godwit flew about {{Convert|12,200|km|mi|abbr=on}} non-stop in its migration from Alaska to New Zealand, previously a record for avian non-stop flight.<ref>{{Cite web |title='Jet fighter' godwit breaks world record for non-stop bird flight |last=Boffey |first=Daniel |newspaper=The Guardian |date=13 October 2020 |url= https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/oct/13/jet-fighter-godwit-breaks-world-record-for-non-stop-bird-flight}}</ref> In October 2022, a 5 month old, male bar-tailed godwit was tracked from Alaska to Tasmania, a trip that took 11 days, and recorded a non-stop flight of {{Convert|8400|mi|km|abbr=on|order=flip}}.<ref>{{Cite web |title=An Incredible Bird Was Tracked As It Made A Cross-Globe Journey From Alaska To Tasmania (video) |website=The Weather Channel |date=27 October 2022 |url= https://weather.com/science/nature/video/an-incredible-bird-was-tracked-as-it-made-a-cross-globe-journey-from-alaska-to?pl=pl-the-latest |access-date=27 October 2022}}</ref>

The godwits can be distinguished from the curlews by their straight or slightly upturned bills, and from the dowitchers by their longer legs. The winter plumages are fairly drab, but three species have reddish underparts when breeding. The females are appreciably larger than the males.

Godwits were once popular as food in the British Isles. Sir Thomas Browne writing in about 1682 noted that godwits "were accounted the daintiest dish in England".<ref name=OED/>

thumb|A flock of migratory waders, dominated by bar-tailed

==Taxonomy== The genus ''Limosa'' was introduced by the French zoologist Mathurin Jacques Brisson in 1760 with the black-tailed godwit (''Limosa limosa'') as the type species.<ref>{{ cite book | last=Brisson | first=Mathurin Jacques | author-link=Mathurin Jacques Brisson | year=1760 | title=Ornithologie, ou, Méthode Contenant la Divisio Oiseaux en Ordres, Sections, Genres, Especes & leurs Variétés | language=fr, la | at=[https://biodiversitylibrary.org/page/36010447 Vol. 1, p. 48], [https://biodiversitylibrary.org/page/36294591 Vol. 5, p. 261] | place=Paris | publisher=Jean-Baptiste Bauche }}</ref><ref>{{ cite book | editor-last=Peters | editor-first=James Lee | editor-link=James L. Peters | year=1934 | title=Check-list of Birds of the World | volume=2 | publisher=Harvard University Press | place=Cambridge, Massachusetts | page=263 | url=https://biodiversitylibrary.org/page/14483076 }}</ref> The genus name ''Limosa'' is from Latin and means "muddy", from ''limus'', "mud".<ref>{{cite book | last= Jobling | first= James A. | year= 2010| title= The Helm Dictionary of Scientific Bird Names | url= https://archive.org/details/Helm_Dictionary_of_Scientific_Bird_Names_by_James_A._Jobling | publisher=Christopher Helm | location = London | isbn = 978-1-4081-2501-4 | page =[https://archive.org/details/Helm_Dictionary_of_Scientific_Bird_Names_by_James_A._Jobling/page/n227 227] }}</ref> The English name "godwit" was first recorded in about 1416–17 and is believed to imitate the bird's call.<ref name=OED>{{Cite OED |Godwit}}</ref>

The genus contains four living species:<ref name=ioc>{{cite web | editor1-last=Gill | editor1-first=Frank | editor1-link=Frank Gill (ornithologist) | editor2-last=Donsker | editor2-first=David | year=2019 | title=Buttonquail, plovers, seedsnipe, sandpipers | work=World Bird List Version 9.1 | url=https://www.worldbirdnames.org/bow/buttonquail/ | publisher=International Ornithologists' Union | access-date=3 April 2019 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181221191829/https://www.worldbirdnames.org/bow/buttonquail/ | archive-date=21 December 2018 | url-status=dead }}</ref>

{{Species table |genus= Limosa |authority-name=Brisson |authority-year=1760 |species-count=four|no-note=y|narrow-percent=75}}

{{Species table/row |name= Bar-tailed godwit |binomial=Limosa lapponica |image=File:Bar-tailed Godwit.jpg|image-size=180px |image-alt=|image-caption=Breeding Plumage |image2 =File:Limosa lapponica 2 - Taren Point.jpg|image2-caption=Non-Breeding Plumage |authority-name=Linnaeus |authority-year=1758 |authority-not-original=yes |range= Scandinavia to Alaska, temperate and tropical regions of Australia and New Zealand. |range-image= |range-image-size=180px |size= |habitat= |hunting= |iucn-status= NT |population= |direction= |subspecies={{Collapsible list |expand=yes |title=Five subspecies |bullets=on |''L. l. lapponica'' (Linnaeus, 1758) | ''L. l. yamalensis'' Bom et al. 2021 |''L. l. taymyrensis'' Engelmoer & Roselaar, 1998 |''L. l. menzbieri'' – Portenko, 1936 |''L. l. baueri'' – Naumann, 1836 }} }}

{{Species table/row |name= Black-tailed godwit|binomial=Limosa limosa |image=File:Black tailed godwit (28524431355).jpg|image-size=180px |image-alt=|image-caption=Breeding Plumage |image2 =File:Black-tailed godwit at Ameenpur lake.jpg|image2-caption=Non-Breeding Plumage |authority-name=Linnaeus |authority-year=1758 |authority-not-original=yes |range= the Indian subcontinent, Australia, New Zealand, western Europe and west Africa. |range-image=File:LimosalimosaWorldDistribution.jpg |range-image-size=180px |size= |habitat= |hunting= |iucn-status= NT |population= |direction= |subspecies={{Collapsible list |expand=yes |title=Four subspecies |bullets=on |''L. l. bohaii'' Zhu, Piersma, Verkuil & Conklin, 2020 |''L. l. limosa'' Linnaeus, 1758 |''L. l. islandica'' Brehm, 1831 |''L. l. melanuroides'' Gould, 1846 }} }}

{{Species table/row |name= Hudsonian godwit |binomial=Limosa haemastica |image=File:Hudsonian Godwit - Churchill - Canada 01 (15657156459).jpg|image-size=180px |image-alt=|image-caption=Breeding Plumage |image2 =File:Limosa haemastica - Kogarah Bay.jpg|image2-caption=Non-Breeding Plumage |authority-name=Linnaeus |authority-year=1758 |authority-not-original=yes |range= northern Canada and winters in southern South America. |range-image=File:Limosa haemastica map.svg |range-image-size=180px |size= |habitat= |hunting= |iucn-status= VU |population= |direction= |subspecies= }}

{{Species table/row |name= Marbled godwit |binomial=Limosa fedoa |image=File:Marbled Godwit (4463451677).jpg|image-size=180px |image-alt=|image-caption=Breeding Plumage |image2 =File:Marbled godwit, Limosa fedoa, Moss Landing (Elkhorn Slough and beach), California, USA. (25305609479).jpg|image2-caption=Non-Breeding Plumage |authority-name=Linnaeus |authority-year=1758 |authority-not-original=yes |range= Atlantic, Pacific and Gulf coasts of the US and Mexico. |range-image=File:Limosa fedoa map.svg |range-image-size=180px |size= |habitat= |hunting= |iucn-status= VU |population= |direction= |subspecies={{Collapsible list |expand=yes |title=Two subspecies |bullets=on |''L. f. beringiae'' Gibson & Kessel, 1989 |''L. f. fedoa'' (Linnaeus, 1758) }} }}

{{Species table/end}} ==Fossil species== In addition, there are two or three species of fossil prehistoric godwits. ''Limosa vanrossemi'' is known from the Monterey Formation (Late Miocene, approx. 6 mya) of Lompoc, United States. ''Limosa lacrimosa'' is known from the Early Pliocene of Western Mongolia (Kurochkin, 1985). ''Limosa gypsorum'' of the Late Eocene (Montmartre Formation, some 35 mya) of France may have actually been a curlew or some bird ancestral to both curlews and godwits (and possibly other Scolopacidae), or even a rail, being placed in the monotypic genus ''Montirallus'' by some (Olson, 1985). Certainly, curlews and godwits are rather ancient and in some respects primitive lineages of scolopacids, further complicating the assignment of such possibly basal forms.<ref>{{cite journal | last1 = Thomas | first1 = Gavin H. | last2 = Wills | first2 = Matthew A. | last3 = Székely | first3 = Tamás | date = 2004 | title = A supertree approach to shorebird phylogeny | journal =BMC Evol. Biol. | volume = 4 | page = 28 | doi = 10.1186/1471-2148-4-28 | doi-access=free | pmid = 15329156 | pmc=515296}}</ref>

In a 2001 study comparing the ratios cerebrum to brain volumes in various dinosaur species, Hans C. E. Larsson found that more derived dinosaurs generally had proportionally more voluminous cerebrum.<ref name="csaharicus-endo-allo-27" /> ''Limosa gypsorum'', then regarded as a ''Numenius'' species, was a discrepancy in this general trend.<ref name="csaharicus-endo-allo-30" /> ''L. gypsorum'' was only 63% of the way between a typical reptilian ratio and that of modern birds.<ref name="csaharicus-endo-allo-30" /> However, this may be explainable if the endocast was distorted, as it had been previously depicted in the past by Deschaseaux, who is described by Larsson as calling the endocast "slightly anteroposteriorly sheared and laterally compressed."<ref name="csaharicus-endo-allo-30" />

== Citations == {{Reflist|refs= <ref name="csaharicus-endo-allo-27">"Allometric Comparison", in Larsson (2001). p. 27.</ref> <ref name="csaharicus-endo-allo-30">"Allometric Comparison", in Larsson (2001). p. 30.</ref> }}

== General sources == * {{cite journal | last1 = Gill | first1 = R. E. Jr. | last2 = Piersma | first2 = T. | last3 = Hufford | first3 = G. | last4 = Servranckx | first4 = R. | last5 = Riegen | first5 = A. | year = 2005 | title = Crossing the ultimate ecological barrier: evidence for an 11,000-km-long non-stop flight from Alaska to New Zealand and Eastern Australia by Bar-tailed Godwits | url = https://www.rug.nl/research/portal/en/publications/crossing-the-ultimate-ecological-barrier(531c931d-e4bd-427c-a6ad-1496c81d44c0).html| journal = Condor | volume = 107 | pages = 1–20 | doi=10.1650/7613| hdl = 11370/531c931d-e4bd-427c-a6ad-1496c81d44c0 | hdl-access = free }} * Larsson, H. C. E. 2001. Endocranial anatomy of ''Carcharodontosaurus saharicus'' (Theropoda: Allosauroidea) and its implications for theropod brain evolution. pp. 19–33. In: ''Mesozoic Vertebrate Life''. Tanke, D. H., Carpenter, K., Skrepnick, M. W. (eds.). Indiana University Press. * Olson, Storrs L. (1985): Section X.D.2.b. "Scolopacidae". In: Farner, D.S.; King, J.R. & Parkes, Kenneth C. (eds.): ''Avian Biology'' '''8''': 174–175. Academic Press, New York.

* Category:Taxa named by Mathurin Jacques Brisson