GALLINAGO MEDIA 83 



In the most southern portion of its breeding range its eggs may be 

 taken as early as the first week in April, and through May into 

 early June, but in the more northern latitudes it will not be found 

 to lay until at least a month later, and few, if any, eggs will be taken 

 before June. 



It is very doubtful if the Great Snipe " drums " in the true sense 

 of the word. Dr. Bahr as a result of his experiments with the tail of 

 this snipe, writes " the feathers produce no sound," a result which 

 he obtained only from experiments with the tail feathers of the Great 

 Snipe and the Jack Snipe. 



It does, however, produce a sound during the breeding season, 

 which has not yet been explained, and may therefore be either vocal 

 or mechanical. 



Professor Collett in ' Dresser's Birds of Europe ' (vol. vii, p. G35) 

 thus describes its breeding habits : — 



" It has a so-called Lck or Spcl like some of the Grouse trilje, a 

 sort of meeting-place where they collect to drum and often to engage 

 in combat for the possession of the females. ... It does not 

 indulge in aerial evolutions, but remains on the ground. . . . The 

 male bird utters a soft, almost warbling note, which is accompanied 

 by a peculiar snapping sound caused by striking the mandibles 

 together several times in quick succession. If a person approaches 

 one of their humming places he can hear at some distance the low 

 note ; ' bip, bip, biphip, bip-biperere, biperere ; ' and when within 

 100 paces, if the night is still, he begins to hear other peculiar 

 sounds. . . . Whilst producing these notes the bird is in ecstasy 

 and raises and spreads his tail like a fan, the outer tail feathers 

 showing in the half darkness like two white patches." 



Dr. Bahr conjectures that these sounds are vocal, but he has 

 shown (vide G. gaUuiagu) that the drumming of the Common Snipe 

 can be produced, under certain circumstances, on the ground, and 

 it therefore seems possible that the Great Snipe also " drums " by 

 some mechanical vibration of his tail feathers. 



Seebohm says that this snipe 



" Makes its nest in long grass, but more often in the middle of a 

 hillock of sedge or grasses. A small quantity of moss or dead grass 

 is placed as a lining to the depression where its four eggs are laid." 



The eggs of the Great Snipe are very handsome, and vary in 



