Gallinago gallinago
Silhouette: Jamie Whitehouse · PhyloPic
In 3 days <5% in a week ~10%
The common snipe (Gallinago gallinago, formerly also known as Gallinago cælestis) is a small, stocky wader native to the Old World, where it breeds in marshes, bogs, tundra and wet meadows. It is usually shy and well-camouflaged, foraging in soft mud mainly for insects and earthworms but also some plant material. During courtship, males perform a "winnowing" display; flying high in circles and then taking shallow dives to produce a "drumming" sound by vibrating the tail feathers.
The breeding habitats are marshes, bogs, tundra and wet meadows throughout the Palearctic. In the north, the distribution limit extends from Iceland over the north of the British Isles and northern Fennoscandia, where it occurs at around 70°N, as well as through European Russia and Siberia. Here it is mostly on the northern edge of the Taiga zone at 71°N, but reaches 74°N on the east coast of the Taymyr Peninsula. In the east it extends to Anadyr, Kamchatka, Bering Island and the Kuril Islands, The southern boundary of the distribution area in Europe runs through northern Portugal, central France, northern Italy, Bulgaria, and Ukraine, with populations in the west being only very... Wikipedia →
| # | City | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Quanzhou | 🇨🇳 China | |
| 2 | Naha | 🇯🇵 Japan | |
| 3 | Ouagadougou | 🇧🇫 Burkina Faso | |
| 4 | Liverpool | 🇬🇧 United Kingdom | |
| 5 | Helsinki | 🇫🇮 Finland | |
| 6 | Riyadh | 🇸🇦 Saudi Arabia | |
| 7 | Abu Dhabi | 🇦🇪 United Arab Emirates | |
| 8 | Chattogram | 🇧🇩 Bangladesh | |
| 9 | Indore | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 10 | Rabat | 🇲🇦 Morocco |
Rare
Under 5% of wildlife watchers report a Common Snipe sighting in Dublin on a given day, based on 66 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data. It is the 110th most-seen of the 145 birds we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to under 5%, and over a week to about 10%, if each day is a fresh chance.
Any time of year
In every month with enough records, under 5% of wildlife watchers report a Common Snipe in Dublin on a given day, so our monthly data shows no clear season.
Between 3 and 6 pm
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Common Snipe sightings with a recorded time, and about 9 in 10 of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is a daytime animal.
71st of 103
Of the 103 cities where we can rate Common Snipe sightings, Dublin ranks 71st at under 5%. The best odds are in Quanzhou (China, about 40%), Naha (Japan, about 40%) and Ouagadougou (Burkina Faso, about 20%).
Same family: Scolopacidae
The closest relatives of the Common Snipe that you can see in Dublin (family Scolopacidae, Sandpipers and Allies) are Common Redshank (about 20%), Ruddy Turnstone (about 20%) and Eurasian Curlew (about 20%), with each one's daily chance of a sighting.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Common Snipe is recorded against all the birds logged in Dublin (66 verified sightings), calibrated against known sighting rates. Figures are rounded to the nearest 10% because citizen-science data supports honest approximations, not decimals, and months with records from fewer than five people show "—". How it works.
