Eurasian Woodcock

Seen one? Add it to your free UK BirdedexHear its song and see the mapFree, no app download. Uncommon bird: +3 points when you log it.

Eurasian Woodcock in the UK

Woodcock is both a resident breeder and a winter visitor. The breeding population is put at around 55,000 to 57,000 males. A 2013 survey found a 29% fall in ten years, and the breeding range shrank by about half between the 1968-72 and 2008-11 atlases. That decline is why it is Red-listed in the UK. Winter is a different picture: about 1.4 million birds are thought to be here, most of them migrants from the Continent. Breeding birds are missing from much of central and south-west England and large parts of Wales, but wintering birds are found almost everywhere.

Where and when to see a Eurasian Woodcock

For breeding birds, stand at the edge of a large damp wood, a clearing or a wide ride at dusk from April to June and watch for roding males circling at treetop height. Big forests such as Thetford, the New Forest and Kielder, and woods across the Scottish Highlands, are good areas. From November to March Woodcock are in any thick cover, including coastal scrub and urban parks in cold snaps, though you mostly see one only when it bursts from underfoot. Watch woodland edges at last light as birds fly out to feed on pasture.

Habitat, diet and field notes

Habitat: Damp deciduous woodland.
Diet: Earthworms.
Field note: Roding flight at dusk in spring.

How to identify a Eurasian Woodcock

A plump, long-billed wader with a body about the size of a Woodpigeon's and a short tail. The plumage is a dead-leaf mix of rufous, buff and black, with broad dark bars across the back of the crown. Snipe have stripes running along the head. The eyes sit high and far back, which gives almost all-round vision. Flushed birds rise with a clatter and weave away between the trunks on broad, rounded wings with the bill angled down. Roding males fly a steady circuit over the canopy with slow, flickering beats.

Call and song

Usually silent when flushed. Roding males give two or three deep, frog-like croaks followed by a sharp, high 'tsiwick'. The squeak carries further than the croaks, so you often hear it first. Heard something you cannot place? Bird Hear identifies UK birds from a 10 second recording, free in your browser.

Confusion species

• Common Snipe: Snipe is smaller and slimmer with a striped head and back, lives on open wet ground and zigzags away calling when flushed.
• Jack Snipe: Jack Snipe is far smaller with a shorter bill and gold back stripes, and drops back into the marsh after a short, silent flight.

Related guide Bird migration in Britain.

Conservation status and Birdedex points

In the Birdedex the Eurasian Woodcock is an Uncommon tier bird, worth +3 points when you log one. It is Red-listed in Birds of Conservation Concern 5, the highest level of concern in the UK.

Recent UK sightings

Similar birds

• Marsh TitUncommon · Mature deciduous woodland
• Lesser Spotted WoodpeckerRare · Mature deciduous woodland
• NuthatchCommon · Mature deciduous woodland
• Willow TitRare · Damp woodland
• Common FirecrestUncommon · Conifers
• Garden WarblerUncommon · Scrub

Eurasian Woodcock: quick answers

When is the best time to see Woodcock?

For roding birds, dusk in May and June, from about 15 minutes after sunset. For migrants, late October and November on the east coast, when newly arrived birds can be found in dunes, gardens and hedges. Hard frost inland pushes birds to the coast and the south-west.

What does a Woodcock eat?

Earthworms above all, plus beetles, insect larvae and other soil invertebrates. It probes soft ground with a bill that has a flexible, sensitive tip. Most feeding is done at night on pasture, which is why birds leave the woods at dusk.

Is the Woodcock rare in the UK?

Not in winter, when it is one of our most numerous waders, though seldom seen. As a breeding bird it is in trouble, with fewer males and a much smaller range than in the 1970s. Possible causes include drier woods, heavier deer browsing and a loss of young, varied woodland.

Kit that helps

Bird ID starter kit. Affiliate links, our own picks, no extra cost to you.