SNIPE

A 'Snipe' is any of nearly 20 very similar wading bird species in three genera in the family Scolopacidae. They characterised by a very long slender bill and cryptic plumage. The ''Gallinago'' snipes have a nearly worldwide distribution, the ''Lymnocryptes'' Jack Snipe is restriced to Asia and Europe and the ''Coenocorypha'' snipes are restriced to New Zealand. The three species of painted snipe are not closely related to these, and are placed in their own family, the Rostratulidae.

Contents

Description

Genera

References

External links

Description

Snipe in the family Scolopacidae belong either to the small genera ''Coenocorypha'' (the New Zealand snipes) and ''Lymnocryptes'', or to the about 15 typical snipes in the genus ''Gallinago''. The latter are the closest relatives of the woodcocks , whereas the small genera represent earlier divergences in the snipe/woodcock clade (Thomas ''et al.'', 2004).
They search for invertebrates in the mud with a "sewing-machine" action of their long bills.
Most have distinctive displays, usually given at dawn or dusk.
English manuscripts dating from the 15th century indicate that the bird was originally called a "snyte" (Austin, 1888).
Some snipe species have been hunted for food and sport since the invention of the shotgun. They can be extremely difficult targets, confounding even very skilled hunters with their erratic flight, their unexpected flushes, their excellent natural camouflage and the treacherous and difficult terrain they typically inhabit.
The elusive nature of the snipe is well-known among hunters. In the days of market hunting, the most skilled hunters of all would often bring many Common Snipe to market earning the nickname "sniper" as a badge of respect for the difficulty in shooting this amazing little bird. The term has evolved into the modern usage sniper, referring to a skilled anti-personnel military sharpshooter.

Genera

★ ''Coenocorypha''

★ ''Lymnocryptes''

★ ''Gallinago''
Fossil bones of some undescribed ''Gallinago'' species most similar to the Great Snipe have been recovered in Late Miocene or Early Pliocene deposits (c. 5 mya) of Lee Creek Mine, USA.

References

★ 'McKelvie', Colin Laurie : Woodcock and Snipe: Conservation and Sport (Swan Hill, 1993)

★ 'Thomas', Gavin H.; Wills, Matthew A. & Székely, Tamás (2004): A supertree approach to shorebird phylogeny. ''BMC Evol. Biol.'' '4': 28. PDF fulltext Supplementary Material

★ 'Austin', Thomas. Two Fifteenth-Century Cookery-Books. Harleian MS. 279 & Harl. MS. 4016, with extracts from Ashmole MS. 1429, Laud MS. 553, & Douce MS 55. London: for The Early English Text Society by N. Trübner & Co., 1888

External links

★ Snipe videos on the Internet Bird Collection