Rostratula benghalensis
Silhouette: Sheatherius · PhyloPic
In 3 days <5% in a week ~10%
The greater painted-snipe (Rostratula benghalensis) is a species of wader in the small painted-snipe family Rostratulidae. It widely distributed across Africa and southern Asia and is found in a variety of wetland habitats, including swamps and the edges of larger water bodies such as lakes and rivers. This species is sexually dimorphic with the female being larger and more brightly coloured than the male. The female is normally polyandrous with the males incubating the eggs and caring for the young.
The greater painted-snipe was formally described in 1758 by the Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus in the tenth edition of his Systema Naturae. He placed it with the rails in the genus Rallus and coined the binomial name Rallus benghalenis. Linnaeus based his account on the "Bengall water rail" that had been described and illustrated in 1738 by the English naturalist Eleazar Albin in his A Natural History of Birds. Albin had examined a drawing that had been sent to the English silk-pattern designer Joseph Dandridge from Bengal. The greater painted-snipe is now placed with the Australian painted-snipe in the genus Rostratula that was introduced in 1816 by the French ornithologist... Wikipedia →
| # | City | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Ouagadougou | 🇧🇫 Burkina Faso | |
| 2 | N'Djamena | 🇹🇩 Chad | |
| 3 | Quanzhou | 🇨🇳 China | |
| 4 | Kota | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 5 | Vasai-Virar | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 6 | Serrekunda | 🇬🇲 Gambia | |
| 7 | Coimbatore | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 8 | Thiruvananthapuram | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 9 | Taichung | 🇹🇼 Taiwan | |
| 10 | Kozhikode | 🇮🇳 India |
Rare
Under 5% of wildlife watchers report a Greater Painted-Snipe sighting in Etosha National Park on a given day, based on 28 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data from 2019 to 2026. It is the 201st most-seen of the 260 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.
October
In that month about 10% of wildlife watchers report a Greater Painted-Snipe in Etosha National Park on a given day, against under 5% in November to September, the lowest months. That is one of Etosha National Park's driest months, with almost no rain against 75 mm in January.
Between 3 and 6 pm
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Greater Painted-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.
26th of 39
Of the 39 parks where we can rate Greater Painted-Snipe sightings, Etosha National Park ranks 26th at under 5%. The best odds are in Amboseli National Park (Kenya, about 10%), Niokolo-Koba National Park (Senegal, about 10%) and Ranthambore National Park (India, about 10%).
Same order: Charadriiformes
The closest relatives of the Greater Painted-Snipe that you can see in Etosha National Park (order Charadriiformes, Shorebirds and Allies) are Blacksmith Lapwing (about 80%), Crowned Lapwing (about 40%) and Double-banded Courser (about 30%), with each one's daily chance of a sighting.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Greater Painted-Snipe is recorded against all the birds logged in Etosha National Park (28 verified sightings from 2019 to 2026), 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.
