The Snipes. 
189 
fourteen, and has a shorter bill (two-and-a-half inches) than the Common Snipe, 
though it is a larger and heavier bird than the latter species. It has occurred in 
every part of the United Kingdom, and a few are shot every autumn. It nests in 
Northern Europe, as well as in Holland and Northern Germany, as far as the valley 
of the Yenesei in Siberia, and it winters in Africa. The males congregate in small 
parties during the nesting-season, like the Ruffs, and are not shy, feeding mostly 
in the evenings. The nest is a depression in a tuft of grass, with a little 
moss or dead grass for lining, and the eggs, four in number and pear-shaped, are 
stone-grey or clay-colour, with strongly marked black blotches, generally clustered 
round the larger end of the egg. The length varies from an inch-and-three- 
quarters to nearly two inches. 
Europe, east to Central Asia, and winters in the Mediterranean and Red Seas, as 
well as in India, Burma, and China. In autumn and winter the Snipe, without 
being exactly gregarious, is found in considerable numbers in the same marsh, 
and instances are on record of flocks having been noticed. During the breeding- 
season the male has a curious habit of ‘ drumming ’ in the air, which seems to 
be a kind of love-song. The nest is a small depression lined with dead grass, 
and is placed in a tuft of grass or clump of sedge. The eggs are four in number, 
and are brownish clay-colour or stone-grey with blotches and spots of black, 
reddish-brown and purplish-grey; the length is about an inch-and-a-half to an 
THE 
COMMON SNIPE. 
(Gallinago 
gallinago.) 
The Common Snipe has a long bill (2-8 inches) and may be 
recognised by the blackish bars on a rufescent ground on the 
outer tail-feathers. It nests everywhere in Great Britain in 
localities suited to its habits, and large numbers visit 11s in the 
autumn and winter. It also breeds in northern and temperate 
inch-and-three-quarters. 
Sabine’s Snipe is only a 
dark form of the Common 
Snipe, and occurs not 
unfrequently. 
This is 
a smaller 
JACK SNIPE 
going ones, 
The Jack Snipe. 
Sabine's Snipe. 
and has a blackish wedge- 
shaped tail, composed of 
only twelve feathers. The 
breast-bone is also remark- 
able for having two notches 
in its posterior border. The 
