Anja Murray: Shy — and red-listed — woodcock still on legal hunting list

What woodcock do instead each year in spring, is an aerial dance to impress potential mates. High above the pockets of broadleaved woodland where woodcock live, the males of this solitary species perform their aerial display flight, known as ‘roding’, beginning in late February and continuing through to the summer. 

As dusk descends, male woodcock fly up in to the sky where they can be seen, zig zagging round a set circuit while making a continuous repeated two-part call that consists of alternate high-pitched squeaks and low, toad-like grunts. Roding is less about males claiming or maintaining territory against other males, and more about showing off for the ladies.

Roding woodcock are always a pleasure to hear and see while working. Night surveying can be quite rewarding at times! Also a great sun set and new hat for keeping the bugs away! #CCOrnithology pic.twitter.com/zgHcNNAUUs

— Cian Cardiff (@cianbirder) May 23, 2023

Below on the ground, females watch and select their mate based on the stamina and quality of the roding flights and the characteristic calls. Female woodcock can differentiate the males based on the nuances in their calls and then chose which mate she will invite back to her territory to mate. 

But this pairing is short-lived. Males stay near the mated females only until the eggs are laid, to guard against other males coming too close and threatening the success of his genetic lineage. But once the clutch of eggs appear, in a simple scrape on the woodland floor, males leave to resume their roding flights and find other willing mates. 

Female woodcock incubate the eggs and raise the brood alone. If threatened, woodcock mothers can reputedly carry her chicks in flight, tucking them up on her back or clasped between her legs.

Because of the ground nesting habit, woodcock use disguise to protect themselves from predators. Their plumage is mottled brown, blending in perfectly with the tangle of twigs and last year’s leaves beneath the trees. Woodland soils are a cornucopia of invertebrate life, providing generous helpings of worms and other critters that woodcock use their long straight bill to poke down and extract from the soil. 

The long bill is clearly depicted in the image of a woodcock in flight that adorned Ireland’s first free state farthing coin, in use from 1928 to 1969, and then on the seven-sided 50-pence piece that I remember from childhood.

Each winter, Ireland’s resident breeding population of woodcock swells with arrivals from Northwest Russia and Scandinavia, where the ground is frozen solid in winter months. These migrants leave again in spring, flying 2-3,000 kilometres back to the breeding grounds where they themselves were born. Irish woodcock, on the other hand, tend to remain here throughout the year, without any need to migrate.

Repeated surveys of resident breeding populations have shown that since the 1970s, woodcock have been declining in Ireland. Their range has contracted by more than 70% in this time period, earning them a place on the ‘red list’ of birds of conservation concern in Ireland — the highest ranking of concern. 

As with many species in decline, their pressures are multi-faceted. Agricultural intensification has led to clearance of hedgerows, scrub and small woodland patches where woodcock nest. 

Overgrazing by deer removes the undergrowth in deciduous woods that woodcock need to shelter among and that helps protect them from predators. Long spells of dry weather in spring due to climate change can dry out the ground, making it harder for woodcock to probe in soft wet soil for the invertebrates they feed on.

Woodcock have long been popular as a game bird here, and across much of their European range. Mostly gun dogs will flush woodcock from the undergrowth into the path of the hunter so the bird can then be shot. 

It is unknown just how many woodcock are shot each year, as hunters are currently not officially obliged to submit such information. We do know, however, that hunting is the main cause of mortality for woodcock in Ireland. And while hunting is unlikely to be the cause of their demise, with the species struggling to survive across Ireland and populations becoming more and more fragmented, hunting pressure can’t be helping. Most conservation scientists would agree that woodcock should no longer be on the quarry list of birds that can be freely shot across Ireland.

In 2023, the Government reviewed which birds can legally hunted in Ireland and when. The review resulted in four species of duck being removed from the quarry list — birds that can be shot during open season. Many expected that woodcock would also be removed from this list because of its red listed conservation status, but not so.

In order to prevent further declines of this much-loved wader and give the population a chance to recover, landscape scale restoration is needed. With less than 2% of Ireland currently covered in native, deciduous woodland, safe spaces for breeding woodcock are few and far between. 

Large tracts of continuous deciduous woodland are needed, for woodcock and many other woodland species, along with a much-needed strategy to control pillaging deer. Hunters and conservation ecologists, already overlapping in ideals and objectives, must do more to collaborate.