BirdBrain Academy

Shorebirds · Scolopacidae

Wilson's Snipe sounds

Gallinago delicata

The Wilson's Snipe is a small, stocky shorebird once treated as a subspecies of the common snipe.

Learn bird sounds freeMore Wilson's Snipe recordings
Wilson's Snipe
Photo: Gallinago-delicata-002.jpg: Mdf derivative work: Donkey shot, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Listen to the Wilson's Snipe

Each recording below is a short excerpt with its spectrogram, a picture of the sound. Time runs left to right and higher pitches sit higher up. Play each one, then look for the same shape in the next. Different recordings of the same bird help you learn the bird, not one clip.

Song · recording 1 Spectrogram of a Wilson's Snipe song: time runs left to right and pitch rises upward

Recorded by Doug Hynes, "the Fen", near Churchill Northern Studies Centre, Manitoba, 2010-06-20. XC609619 on xeno-canto, CC BY-SA 4.0. Five-second excerpt.

Song · recording 2 Spectrogram of a Wilson's Snipe song: time runs left to right and pitch rises upward

Recorded by Doug Hynes, "the Fen", near Churchill Northern Studies Centre, Manitoba, 2010-06-20. XC609619 on xeno-canto, CC BY-SA 4.0. Five-second excerpt.

Song · recording 3 Spectrogram of a Wilson's Snipe song: time runs left to right and pitch rises upward

Recorded by Doug Hynes, "the Fen", near Churchill Northern Studies Centre, Manitoba, 2010-06-20. XC609619 on xeno-canto, CC BY-SA 4.0. Five-second excerpt.

What to listen for

During courtship, the male makes a winnowing display, circling high and taking shallow dives to produce a distinctive sound similar to a boreal owl.

When you are most likely to hear it: Winnowing may be heard throughout the day and long into the night..

What it looks like

Adults are 23–28 cm long, with short greenish-grey legs and a very long straight dark bill. They are mottled brown above and pale below, with a dark eye stripe bordered by light stripes.

Where to find it

They breed in marshes, bogs, tundra, and wet meadows in Canada, the northern United States, and the Chukchi Peninsula. Shy and well camouflaged, they forage in soft mud and flush in zig-zag flight when approached closely.

BirdBrain regions that include this bird

  • Alaska
  • Andean Region
  • Arctic
  • California
  • Eastern Canada
  • Florida
  • Great Lakes
  • Mexico
  • Mid-Atlantic
  • Northern Europe
  • Northern South America
  • Plains
  • Polynesia
  • Southeast
  • Southwest
  • Texas
  • Western Canada
  • Western Russia

Did you know?

  • Its common name commemorates the American ornithologist Alexander Wilson.
  • The specific name delicata is Latin for "dainty".
  • It was treated as a subspecies of the common snipe until 2003.

Learn the Wilson's Snipe by ear

BirdBrain Academy teaches bird sounds with side-by-side listening and quizzes that use different recordings, so you learn the bird rather than one clip. Start with six free lessons, no signup needed. On your phone, Sound ID can name the birds singing around you.

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Related birds

Species notes are adapted from Wikipedia, available under CC BY-SA 4.0, and checked for BirdBrain. Recordings come from xeno-canto under the licenses shown with each one. Photo: Gallinago-delicata-002.jpg: Mdf derivative work: Donkey shot, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons. Identification guidance is educational; birds vary, so confirm unusual sightings with local experts or eBird.