Those familiar with the snipe hunt as a hazing ritual often don’t realize that snipe are real; in fact there are many species around the world, but only one in North America. I was gratified some years back when it got reclassified and regained the name Wilson’s Snipe (from namesake Alexander Wilson, “father of American ornithology”) after a period when it had been considered co-specific with the old world Common Snipe. I couldn’t get any photos this time around, but both sandpipers are shown on my Calvert Vaux Park page. The Upland seen there in 2010 was considered a good sighting as they are very rarely seen in NYC proper, but in heavily trafficked parks like Prospect they're all but unheard of, hence the brief early-morning encounter before the joggers and dog walkers arrived to drive off the field birds.
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- alex 4-27-2012 12:42 pm