Habitat
Freshwater or brackish wetlands, including marshes, highland bogs, wetlands around artificial water bodies, ditches, inland deltas, swampy lake edges, seasonally flooded grasslands and wet moorlands. From 1,500 - 4,000 m.
Angola, Botswana, Burundi, Congo [The Democratic Republic of the], Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, Rwanda, South Africa (B), Sudan, Swaziland, Tanzania [United Republic of], Uganda, Zambia (B), Zimbabwe.
Throughout South Africa, extending northwards to Angola and East Africa to Ethiopia.
Population
Estimated population is 30,000 - 230,000 (2010).
Status LC
Habitat loss and degradation owing to encroachment, overgrazing, burning and the drainage of wetland areas by peasant farmers are the main threats.
For more information see BirdLife International Species Factsheet.
Food
Larvae of flies, beetles, dragonflies. Also worms, small crustacea and molluscs.
African Snipe (Gallinago nigripennis) [XC701493]
by Tony Archer from First Wetland Zone 4, Macaneta, Incomati Delta, Marracuene District, Maputo Province, Mozambique (song)
African Snipe (Gallinago nigripennis) [XC484900]
by Tony Archer from Klerksdorp, Southern DC, North West, South Africa (drumming, flight call)
Nest
Grass woven into a plaform hidden beneath a tuft of grass, the blades of which are pulled over to give shade and protection.
Eggs (Guide)
2; glossy, olive-buff with scattered spots of slate and large slate-brown, olive-brown or black blotches; pyriform; 37 - 45 x 27 x 32.
Subspecies
May form superspecies with Common Snipe (Gallinago gallinago) and South American Snipe (Gallinago paraguaiae), and all sometimes treated as conspecific.
The following 3 subspecies are recognised:
aequatorialis Rüppell, 1845 - Ethiopia through Uganda, eastern Zaire, Kenya and Tanzania to Malawi, eastern Zimbabwe and northern Mozambique.
angolensis Barboza du Bocage, 1868 - Angola and Namibia through Botswana to Zambia and western Zimbabwe.
nigripennis Bonaparte, 1839 - Southern Mozambique and South Africa.
BirdLife International Species Factsheet