Fancy this flight: American woodcock courts with high rise, side-slipping, fluttering descent

If you’re in the right place at the right time during the coming month, you might have a chance to witness one of nature’s most impressive courtship flights.

The American woodcock, also called the timberdoodle, is considered essentially an upland sandpiper since it has replaced life on the lakeshore and mud flats for life in damp woods, overgrown hollows, bottomlands, boggy runs and second growth, shrubby woods.

Woodcocks winter in the southern United States from east Texas to Florida and are arriving in Missouri as you read this. Some will remain here, while others will pass through for summer breeding grounds as far north as Southern Ontario and Manitoba and east to Nova Scotia and even to Newfoundland.

Eastern Kansas is pretty much their western range.

Woodcocks are considered uncommon breeders in our area, but a little patience in the proper habitat might reward you with a chance this spring to see a mating display like no other. You’ll know it if you see it.

The male catches the female’s attention, then begins a circular, rising flight in which the flight circles grow wider and wider with each circle as the bird rises well over 200 feet — at which time it descends like a falling leaf with side slips and flutters till it reaches the ground, then walks stiff-legged to the waiting female, who is still waiting only if she was impressed.

Woodcocks are among the earliest arriving summer visitors. They are the last of the shorebirds, other than killdeer, to migrate south come autumn.

Without the mating flight as identification, woodcocks are easily confused with snipe and dowitchers, which also are brown with thick bodies, short legs and very long bills.

There are major differences to help the rookie birder. First, dowitchers are slightly larger with longer, yellow legs, and they are waders, almost always in or near water.

Snipes are occasionally found in the same area as woodcocks. On first look, they can be confusing. The woodcock is a more compact bird with shorter legs. It has a flesh-colored bill; the snipe’s bill is dark.

The woodcock’s breast and belly are rufous; the snipe’s breast is streaked, and its belly is white.

In silhouette, the shorter neck of the woodcock and the very large eyes and complete eye ring set far up and to the rear of the head, allowing the woodcock to sink its bill deep in the mud looking for earthworms and still being able to see any impending danger.

Woodcocks migrate north as the ground thaws. The favorite food is the earthworm, and they prefer their favorite food not to be frozen.

The woodcock’s bill has a very mobile, sensitive tip that allows the bird to both feel the earthworm and to open the tip to grab the earthworm while the bill is still underground.

The woodcock can eat at least its weight in earthworms daily, which can be at least 6 ounces for males and 7 ounces for females. More than one researcher has reported that the birds have been found to strike the ground hard with their stubbby feet and legs to get movement from the earthworm below, which then becomes dinner.

At least 75 percent of the woodcock’s diet is earthworms, but it also relies on slugs, sow bugs and flies that live in moist ground. It adds all varieties of insects and even flower and grass seed with grasshoppers as dessert.

Woodcocks have also been known to carry eggs and newly-hatched chicks between their legs and thighs to safe places, if disturbed.

Getting to know the woodcock should make an interesting project for you this spring and summer. They’ve been seen at the Columbia Audubon Nature Area near Bonnyview park and at most diverse natural areas such as Eagle Bluffs and Forum Wetlands.