Figure 142. The Committee evaluated many records of the Ruff during its eight years on the review list. The species proved to be of annual occurrence in small numbers, particularly as a fall vagrant along the coast, although it also winters annually and has occurred inland on numerous occasions. This first-fall bird was photographed on 23 August 2001 at the mouth of the Carmel River in Monterey County (John Sorensen).

 

Figure 143. This winter Ruff was photographed on 20 January 2001—two decades after the CBRC stopped reviewing this species’ records—in Newark, Alameda County (Les Chibana).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

RUFF Philomachus pugnax (Linnaeus, 1758)

Accepted: 31 (89%)	Treated in Appendix H: no
Not accepted: 4	CBRC review: records from 1974 through 19811
Not submitted/reviewed: NA	Color image: none

This shorebird breeds across arctic and subarctic Eurasia and south into temperate latitudes in Europe. It has nested casually in northwestern Alaska. The vast majority of birds, including some from northeastern Siberia, migrate to tropical Africa (Cramp 1983), although the winter range extends to the British Isles and India (and rarely farther east). The species occurs as a rare to very rare migrant, mainly in fall, from western Alaska south along the Pacific slope through southern California, becoming casual on the Baja California Peninsula. Records average approximately five per fall in Oregon. The species is also a rare migrant in Hawaii, along the Atlantic coast, and through the West Indies. In the East, Ruffs are about equally numerous during spring and fall migrations, with adults in July and early August accounting for most of the southbound birds (unlike in the West, where young birds predominate in fall; see below). The species occurs casually across the continent’s interior, mostly east of the Rocky Mts. Sight records extend south to Venezuela and Peru.

California’s first Ruff, a bird present from 9 to 23 September 1961 at Bodega Bay in Sonoma County, was followed by an adult female collected on 30 March 1962 at the mouth of the San Diego River in San Diego County (McCaskie 1963, SDNHM 30290). The latter bird likely wintered locally, as did at least seven of the 31 Ruffs endorsed by the CBRC during the species’ eight-year period of review. Small numbers winter in the state each year, predominantly between mid September and early May, although one that wintered at the south end of San Diego Bay, San Diego County, for eight straight years arrived as early as 26 June (in 1983; AB 37:1027). Ruffs are most numerous in California as autumn migrants, many of them young birds found in September and October. There are few records of genuine spring vagrants (as opposed to lingering birds from the previous winter). Adults of both sexes are occasionally encountered, including flamboyantly plumed males.

During this species’ short stint on the review list, the Committee made no concerted effort to obtain documentation for all records. In autumn 1979, for example, only seven records were reviewed out of at least 11 reported statewide (AB 34:196, 201). Shortly thereafter the species was shown to occur in the state regularly (Roberson 1980), leading the CBRC to suspend further review of these records.

¹On the review list 1972–1980