Apparent Wilson's Snipe, Lower Moors, St Mary's, Isles of Scilly 21 October 2007

Apparent Wilson's Snipe at Lower Moors, St Mary's, Isles of Scilly.

All images taken on 21st October 2007 by Martin J McGill.

With hand held Nikon Coolpix 995, Swarovski HD 65 with 30x WA.

Whilst guiding on a Birding holiday to the Isles of Scilly, my group and I were fortunate enough to gain great views of this bird and got some images to help with i.d on return home. I got back late on the 22nd and did not sit down to look at them until this evening (23rd). I had intially avoided Lowers Moors as the sightings of the probable Wilson's Snipe was intermittent and I had heard that it had not been seen for a couple of days to 20th at least. As there is little space in the hides I thought I would wait until the island was quieter (many birders had left for home), there were other avian distractions and that we had cleaned up for want of a better term on the birds that were available before trying for this bird and Jack Snipe. I had heard that it was seen again on 21st so decided to give it a go after Pallas's Warbler at Porthellick, a walk around the coast and a stop for coffee at Tolman Cafe.
On entering the ISBG hide we were very lucky to have seats although Len and I had to kneel at one end of the hide. A couple of birders were quite animated as they had seen a very interesting Snipe and got a couple of shots before it dissapeared. Shortly after Len and I located a Snipe that immediately looked interesting but was face on with it's bill tucked into its back. It jumped out as being different instantly, like the bird I saw in 1998?, along with 100's of other birders, at the same location. Not sure who id'd that one but they were sharp to pick up on it and certainly got everyone else thinking about these birds. I watched it for 10-15 minutes before it woke up, stretched it's wings briefly showing a fully barred underwing and began to feed in the open before dissapearing again. It showed many of the right features for Wilson's. It came out with a Common Snipe and the contrast between the two was very obvious. From what I could gather the other two birders in the hide had seen other features and had images and were discussing it. A few other birders joined us including Ash Fisher who put us onto the original Wilson's Snipe, which initially was not showing well, the bird we had been watching was even more contrasting than this one. Whilst everyone was studying this bird I picked up the second bird again alongside a Common Snipe. It fed in the open and I drew the attention of the other birders in the hide to the bird where the two guys said it was the one they had been watching earlier. I gave up my seat to allow Ash to video it and left soon after to study the original Wilson's from the screen and to stand up straight again!

It kind of reminded me of a Stilt Sandpiper (except for it being a Snipe!) not least due to the chestnut patch behind the eye, just a thought as well as other features; less of a bulbous facial appearance and open faced, cold tones having whitish rather than buff tones, the darker parts were blacker, heavily barred flanks with white base colour not buff, the tertial barring was narrow and faded (ghosting toward base) and narrow loral stripe which was even in width. I did not see it fan it's tail. A selection of images follow below.

To Bettie, Len, Chris and Eve, glad you enjoyed the Snipe on offer from this hide, lovely to see you enjoying all of them, I hope these images highlight what we were talking about.