Woodcock

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
This article is about birds. For other uses, see Woodcock (disambiguation).

Woodcock
Closeup of face of long-billed bird
American woodcock
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Aves
Order: Charadriiformes
Family: Scolopacidae
Genus: Scolopax
Linnaeus, 1758
Type species
Scolopax rusticola
Linnaeus, 1758
Diversity
8 living species

The woodcocks are a group of seven or eight very similar living species of wading birds in the genus Scolopax. The genus name is Latin for a snipe or woodcock, and until around 1800 was used to refer to a variety of waders.[1] The English name is first recorded in about 1050.[2] According to the Harleian Miscellany, a group of woodcocks is called a "fall".[3]

Taxonomy

The genus Scolopax was introduced in 1758 by the Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus in the tenth edition of his Systema Naturae.[4] The genus name is Latin for a snipe or woodcock.[1] The type species is the Eurasian woodcock (Scolopax rusticola).[5]

Only two woodcocks are widespread, the others being localized island

Greater Sundas, Wallacea and New Guinea. Their closest relatives are the typical snipes of the genus Gallinago.[6][7] As with many other sandpiper genera, the lineages that led to Gallinago and Scolopax likely diverged around the Eocene, some 55.8–33.9 million years ago, although the genus Scolopax is only known from the late Pliocene onwards.[8]

Woodcock species are known to undergo rapid

Subfossil evidence indicates the presence of another radiation of woodcock species in the Greater Antilles; these Caribbean woodcocks may have been more closely related to the Old World woodcock species than the New World ones, and were likely wiped out by human incursion into the region.[9]

Species

The genus contains eight species:[10][6][11]

Fossil record

A number of woodcocks are

subfossil
bones.

Description and ecology

Scolopax minor concealed in grass
American woodcock

Woodcocks have stocky bodies,

upper mandible is flexible.[6][13][14]

As their common name implies, the woodcocks are woodland birds. They feed at night or in the evenings, searching for invertebrates in soft ground with their long bills. This habit and their unobtrusive plumage makes it difficult to see them when they are resting in the day. Most have distinctive displays known as "roding", usually given at dawn or dusk.[6][14][11]

The range of breeding habits of the Eurasian woodcock extends from the west of

Atlantic breeding stations in Azores, Madeira and the Canary Islands. In Asia the sites can be seen as far south as Kashmir and the Himalayas
.

Hunting

Some woodcocks have become popular

overhunting. The pin feathers (coverts of the leading primary feather of the wing) of the Eurasian woodcock are sometimes used by artists as brushtips for fine painting work.[15]

The cocker spaniel dog breed is named after the bird: the dogs were originally bred to hunt the woodcock.

References

  1. ^
    ISBN 978-1-4081-2501-4
    .
  2. ^ "Woodcock". Oxford English Dictionary (Online ed.). Oxford University Press. (Subscription or participating institution membership required.)
  3. ISBN 978-0-670-30044-0
    .
  4. ^ Linnaeus, Carl (1758). Systema Naturae per regna tria naturae, secundum classes, ordines, genera, species, cum characteribus, differentiis, synonymis, locis (in Latin). Vol. 1 (10th ed.). Holmiae (Stockholm): Laurentii Salvii. p. 145.
  5. ^ Peters, James Lee, ed. (1934). Check-List of Birds of the World. Vol. 2. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. p. 278.
  6. ^
    ISBN 0-395-60237-8
  7. PMID 15329156. Supplementary Material
  8. ISBN 9781408137321
    .
  9. ^
    PMID 26624342. Archived from the original
    (PDF) on 2018-08-02. Retrieved 2018-11-24.
  10. Rasmussen, Pamela, eds. (July 2021). "Sandpipers, snipes, coursers"
    . IOC World Bird List Version 11.2. International Ornithologists' Union. Retrieved 17 August 2021.
  11. ^ a b Kennedy, Robert S.; Fisher, Timothy H.; Harrap, Simon C.B.; Diesmos, Arvin C & Manamtam, Arturo S. (2001). "A new species of woodcock from the Philippines and a re-evaluation of other Asian/Papuasian woodcock" (PDF). Forktail. 17 (1): 1–12.
  12. ^ woodcock (bird) – Britannica Online Encyclopedia. Britannica.com. Retrieved on 2013-03-10.
  13. JSTOR 4077657
    .
  14. ^ a b McKelvie, Colin Laurie (1993): Woodcock and Snipe: Conservation and Sport. Swan Hill.
  15. ISBN 978-0-7153-2501-8
    .

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Scolopax.
Look up woodcock in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Woodcock&oldid=1220007503"