GREATER PAINTED-SNIPE
Rostratula benghalensis

Goudsnip (Afrikaans)

HABITAT
The marshes, swamps, edges of lakes and pans and streams with marginal vegetation in Zululand and along the coast of KwaZulu-Natal.

TYPE
A shy retiring bird of thick reeds and swamp vegetation, it is snipe shaped and sized but has a shorter, purple brown bill, decurved at the tip. The head back and chest are greenish brown to grey in the males and almost russet in the females, a white stripe through the eye and the underparts white. In flight the wings are dark with buff spots, there are four conspicuous gold stripes down the back and in short flights it dangles its legs.

FOOD
It is usually solitary or in pairs and feeds on insects, crustaceans, worms, molluscs and seeds.

BREEDING
It nests from August to March in KwaZulu-Natal, excavating a shallow scrape in moist ground sparsely lined with plant material, occassionally a built-up pad of stems in wet conditions. There are usually four eggs in a clutch and they are coloured yellow ochre to buff and are heavily splotched with with brown, nlack and purple.

STATUS
An uncommon resident with a limited distribution which changes according to the rainfall.