doughbirdn.

1832 New-Eng. Galaxy 18 Feb. The great body of sportsmen..carry on a most destructive warfare against the goose,..the curlew, the dipper, the doe-bird.

1858 W. H. Sumner Hist. E. Boston i. 53 That kind of plover called dough-birds, from their superlative fatness.

1898 Sheboygan (Wisconsin) Times 5 Feb. A broiled doughbird, or a golden plover, cooked on the gridiron, is a delicious piece of game.

1915 E. H. Baynes Wild Bird Guests iv. 53 After spending the winter in South America, the dough birds went back to their northern homes by a different route.

1960 H. M. Hall Gathering of Shore Birds xxiii. 106 A return of the dough-bird, although perhaps unlikely, is not yet beyond the bounds of possibility.

2016 R. J. Lederer Beaks, Bones, & Bird Songs 128 The Eskimo Curlew was nicknamed the ‘doughbird’ because it accumulated so much fat before its southward migration that when it..plopped to the ground, the heavy layer of fat resembled dough.