Need ID Common Snipe or African Snipe from Ethiopia (3 Viewers)

[MiWi]

My colleague and I observed this snipe of the genus Gallinago at Lake Ziway in Ethiopia in December 2020. Unfortunately, we couldn't recognise the outer flight feathers. Does anyone have any ideas and can still identify the snipe (Common or African Snipe)? Many thanks in advance for an answer

 

[tconzemi]

Some African are extremely dark but not all, most or at least many are imho unidentifiable. And I have no idea how reliable the white in outer tail feathers really is. This one surely is not a straightforward dark African, but who knows what it is...

 

[Muppit17]

My colleague and I observed this snipe of the genus Gallinago at Lake Ziway in Ethiopia in December 2020. Unfortunately, we couldn't recognise the outer flight feathers. Does anyone have any ideas and can still identify the snipe (Common or African Snipe)? Many thanks in advance for an answer

Not going to be much use. Never seen African Snipe in the rift valley lakes. I had always been told they were an altitude species and have seen them in the Bale Mountains.

The scapulars should be dark, with minimal fringing between the 'braces'. This one seems well patterned.

In that basis, anywhere else I would call these as Common Snipe, but hope to be educated

 

[njlarsen]

How do we know about the paler birds being African? can there be second year commons that elect not to migrate north making the seasons an unreliable way to separate?
Niels

 

[tconzemi]

How do we know about the paler birds being African? can there be second year commons that elect not to migrate north making the seasons an unreliable way to separate?
Niels

There are no records for Common Snipe in whole of Southern Africa, and still they sometimes look alike, as to Muppit17, yes that's what I heard too: altitude species

 

[MacNara]

Are the first two of my attached photos (same bird) from the Sanetti Plateau, Bale, Ethiopia, African Snipe, as we decided, but are not sure? And the second two, same bird, from near Addis, Common Snipe?

 

[Muppit17]

Are the first two of my attached photos (same bird) from the Sanetti Plateau, Bale, Ethiopia, African Snipe, as we decided, but are not sure? And the second two, same bird, from near Addis, Common Snipe?

View attachment 1628702View attachment 1628703View attachment 1628704View attachment 1628705

On distribution and the dark/light approach then the answer has to be probably.

Certainly I have seen African on Sanetti and Common in the Rift and not the other way around.