Pin-tailed Snipe

The pin-tailed snipe is 25–27cm long, mottled brown above with cream lines down the back, pale below with a streaked buff breast and white belly, and a dark stripe through the eye between pale ones. It has short greenish-grey legs and a long, straight dark bill. It resembles the common snipe but has a shorter bill and tail, less pointed wings without a white trailing edge, and a flatter flight when flushed. Its name comes from its pin-like outer tail feathers, which whistle during the males' group display flights (Wikipedia, general species account).

It breeds in damp marshes and tundra in Arctic and boreal Russia, nesting in a well-hidden spot on the ground, and migrates to southern Asia for the winter. There it uses a variety of wetlands, often with common snipe, but may also be found on drier ground. It probes mud or soft soil, or picks up food by sight, eating mainly insects and earthworms with some plant material. Its normal call is a weak squik. In India it is a winter migrant. SoIB 2023 estimates a long-term decline of about 55% and a current fall of about 6% a year, and rates it a High conservation priority (Wikipedia, general species account; SoIB 2023).