Great Snipe

Great Snipe 

(Gallinago media), a bird of the family Charadriidae of the suborder Charadrii. It measures up to 35 cm long and weighs about 200 g. The plumage is brownish with a dark pattern. The great snipe is distributed in Europe and northern Asia. In the USSR it is found from the western border to the Enisei and from the southern tundra to the forest-steppe zone. A migratory bird, it winters in Africa south of the equator. The males utter their mating calls on the ground, gathering in groups in dry areas. The nests are built in tussocky marshes, and each clutch contains four large speckled eggs. The great snipe’s diet consists mainly of insect larvae and worms, which the birds probe for in the ground with their long beaks. Great snipes are game birds.

REFERENCE

Kozlova, E. V. Rzhankoobraznye. Podotriad kuliki. Moscow-Leningrad, 1962. (Fauna SSSR. Novaia seriia. no. Sl.Ptitsy, vol. 2, fasc. 1, part 3.)