The Marbled Godwit can be an attraction in the landscape in which it lives, which generally consists of short grass and bodies of water.

Such landscapes exist in Grand Forks County, and so do black-tailed godwits. Both the landscapes and the birds are somewhat more numerous to the west and north, in the pothouse area of ​​the Missouri Coteau, from which the water flows northeast to Hudson Bay and southeast to the Gulf of Mexico.

The author of these lines grew up in such a landscape, in Mountrail County, ND, about 275 miles west of Grand Forks. Black-tailed godwits regularly nested and acted as sentinels on the prairie.

Snipe were also found along County Road 33, which runs through a section of prairie between the place Suezette and I built at Gilby, and which we drove along almost every day for a quarter of a century.

The Bar-tailed Godwit is large enough to stand out among all these features, but once it has settled on a nest it is more likely to be mistaken for a rock than a breeding bird and will allow quite close approaches, sometimes to the point of being stepped on.

When disturbed, a bar-tailed godwit will rise up and emit a distinctive call, a shrill, loud noise rendered in bird guides as “Ger witt!” or “bar-tailed godwit,” which is half of the bird’s name.

Then there’s the marbled part. This is a little more puzzling. Snipe are an overall reddish-brown (emphasis on brown, I think) that’s mottled with darker brown and fades on the breast.

But the Black-tailed Godwit’s plumage is not its distinguishing feature. Look at the beak, which is remarkably long, black at the tip, slightly but noticeably curved upwards, and pink closer to the face, with a dark stripe in front of the eye and a white stripe above it.

To see these subtle field markings you need a good eye and clear focus in the binoculars.

And these are not the characteristics that one takes away from an encounter with a Black-tailed Godwit. Its sudden appearance and distress call leave a much greater impression.

Snipe are most commonly seen in the spring, when they are quite conspicuous along County Road 33, sometimes even on the side of the road.

Later in the summer, bar-tailed godwits join other shorebird species at Kelly’s Slough National Wildlife Refuge, which lies between Grand Forks International Airport and Grand Forks Air Force Base. There is a sign along U.S. Highway 2 that will direct you there.

Russ Wilbur reported seeing 20 marbled godwits in the west basin of the swamp, which is crossed by a gravel road leading north from the state highway. I missed them because my Ford Ranger was at the dealer. I’m going to make a trip to the swamp later this week to see what I can see.

Marbled godwits are found in the northern Great Plains, from the Red River Valley through northern North Dakota and Montana to the foothills of the Rocky Mountains. Godwits are found quite far north in the Canadian Prairie provinces, so they are residents of the heart of the continent.

Notably, however, there are three isolated populations, one very close to Grand Forks on Lake of the Woods and one in James Bay in northeastern Ontario. The third is found on the Aleutian Peninsula and the Island Chair in Alaska.

The birds overwinter on the Pacific coast, from San Francisco Bay south to Central America. On the Atlantic coast they overwinter from Chesapeake Bay south to the Mexican Yucatan Peninsula. Some even spend the winter in South America.

Here at home in Kelly’s Slough, the number of waders is increasing. But the big departure is just around the corner. We still have two, maybe three weeks of wader watching ahead of us.

Then come the ducks.

Jacobs is a retired publisher and editor of the Herald. He can be reached at [email protected].