Birds - what can you tell by looking closely at them?

[Tony U]

Woodcock and Yellow, classic loch style fly

[Vagabond]

Alan Stubbs:

The bird apparently feeds on worms by foraging around forest floors - it's bill is well adapted for it, yet has the typical build of a wader(shorebird).... There is something of the sandpiper about it's overall physique.

 

I'd be a little surprised if these birds weren't like our own snipe and woodcock and found frequenting short grass meadows and salt marsh.

Snipe in watermeadows and saltmarsh OK. But have never seen a woodcock in saltmarsh.

 

On Ashdown forest - snipe in open marsh, woodcock in wooded marshy ground

 

The American woodcock I found was in classic "muskeg" country - wood, marsh and mosquitoes.

 

Waders come in all shapes and sizes, from curlew to little stint - its called "diversity" - you even get snipe in the Himalayas.

[ayjay]

Another reason Woodcock are not seen much is that they are mainly nocturnal, like the worms they eat.

 

Short legs mean they are better suited to forest floors and wet fields rather than coastal saltmarsh.

 

I've seen them on the heaths of the New Forest, (which is a lot wetter than you might think), but not on the coast.

 

The one in my pic was shot and stuffed by the wife's Grandfather, it's a bit faded now compard to Newts pic, it now resides in my hall along with a pied blackbird.

[Zigs]

is a pied blackbird a species or just a mutation ?

[Snatcher]

Tony U you are on my wavelenght mate!

[Salar]

Woodcock are one of the few birds with complete 360 deg vision aroundwards and over 180 deg upwards, enable by placement of bulbous eyes on top of bonce. They sit on the forest floor and you can't creep up on them or drop on them. In theory. Nature has yet to evolve protection against No 6 shot.

[Vagabond]

Ironic that Salar - despite their awareness of anything coming from any angle, their main defence is to sit still and rely on camouflage.

 

Very rarely have I seen a sitting woodcock before it flushes close underfoot.

[Newt]

But when the wee beasties do flush, they do so at speed, with noise, and lots of rapid direction changes.

[ayjay]

ziggy searchfield:

is a pied blackbird a species or just a mutation ?

Not a separate species, and not strictly speaking a mutation, it's more of a genetic defect commonly known as leucism.

 

This explains things far better than I could.

 

My camera is packed away ready for an early start on the road tomorrow (a weeks birdwatching in Wales) I'll try and remember to take a pic of the pied blackbird when I get back and either post it here or PM it to you Zig.

[Vagabond]

Newt:

But when the wee beasties do flush, they do so at speed, with noise, and lots of rapid direction changes.

Very true Newt - the ultimate in shooting is a left and a right at woodcock.

 

The same applies to snipe, and an old country adage was - "when he s**ts you shoots" ie during that action the snipe flies straight for a few yards and is an easier target.

 

[ 05. March 2005, 10:32 PM: Message edited by: Vagabond ]