Williamson's Weekly Nature Notes

Nothing to do with the green plover, which is the lapwing or peewit. This wader is one of my favourites of all. It is difficult to find, has the sweetest and most entrancing call of them all, and has a charming habit of bobbing and curtseying.

When I was a young lad and used to shoot the occasional snipe on the Norfolk and Suffolk water meadows, I would even more occasionally flush a green sandpiper. Not often, because they do not freeze like snipe, which makes that bird a possible target. The green sandpiper usually rises well ahead out of harm's way.

Even so, it was a pretty obvious non-target because it would always give that lovely sweet call which I can only attempt to impart to you by writing "tloo-eet weet weet weet".

Not only did that call ensure its safety when this hunter at the age of 17 was tramping the marshes all day with trembling fingers hoping to get something for supper, but so did the big white rump that shone like a lamp. The snipe had none of these defences. So the gun was quickly lowered and the rarity saluted with a tick in the bird-watching book instead of the game diary. Off it would speed, looking mainly black and white, a curious sight indeed.

For full feature see West Sussex Gazette April 22