One of my favorite nocturnal signs of spring is listening to the wild vocalizations and twittering displays of the male American woodcock in late March. It is the earliest migrant species to breed in northern New York. With seemingly countless nicknames—timberdoodle, bog sucker, night partridge, Labrador twister, big-eye, mud bat—you know they must be adored.
The American woodcock is a forest-dwelling shorebird species that nests