The sandpiper who thought he was an ostrich

There are always sandpipers along our beach, and I love watching the flocks race around, fly in aerodynamic precision, and generally stick together in all kinds of weather.

A couple of weeks ago, I was trying to photograph a very large flock sitting huddled together in cold, windy weather on a little strip of sandbar at low tide:

They are lovely little birds, and I focused in closer on a few along the shore:

I tend to put the camera on "continuous shoot" for living creatures so I can capture minute movements and unexpected actions. It continues shooting many times per second as long as I have my finger on the button.  It often isn't until I look at the photos on the computer that I see things I couldn't catch with the human eye.  Like this little guy, who thought he was an ostrich*:

(*To set the record straight, ostriches don't really bury their heads in the sand.  But they dig holes in the sand to make a nest for their eggs, then stick their heads in the holes to turn the eggs several times a day: thus the illusion of burying their heads in the sand! In the above picture, I suspect the sandpiper was merely trying to grab some tasty morsel from the shallows of sand and water along the shoreline.)