Conservationists made a rare breakthrough in the Macquarie Marshes this month when they tagged a tracker onto five Australian Painted Snipes (APS).

The endangered species, which in a 2021 population count recorded just 340 mature-age birds, don't tend to stay in one spot for long.

In fact, NSW wildlife ecologist Matt Herring's team had only caught two since they began tracking them almost two years ago as part of the Australian Painted Snipes and Information and Tracking Project.

So when he received word about three weeks ago from graziers Garry and Leanne Hall saying they spotted around ten of the critters on their property on the edge of the Macquarie Marshes, Matt came out as quickly as he could with researcher Inka Velthiem.

"Almost all of APS sights are just of one or two birds, and they're moving through. They're only there for perhaps a couple of days, a week if you're lucky," Matt said.

"But then we have these tiny handful of sites like Garry and Leanne's, where the birds stay for months."

The team first set up nets on Saturday 5 September where the birds had been seen concentrating.

The birds were caught using mist nets over three days. PHOTO: Australian Painted Snipe Information and Tracking Project

In their first session, they caught Thomasina, named in honour of late Birding NSW president Tom Karplus, who died in August 2023.

They caught Charuni and Knighty in the next section before Dan and Hope flew into the net during a final session on Monday night 7 October.

"We were overjoyed. It's hard enough to find the birds in the first place, let alone catch put a transmitter on them," Matt said.

"They're super rare, but for me I think they're the most beautiful bird in the world. Their pattern, their plumage, is just stunning.

"They love shallow areas with this delicate balance of mud flats and vegetation cover- not too much, not too little. So, they're quite picky."

A BirdLife Australia study published in 2014 found around 39 per cent of the recorded APS population were in the Murray-Darling Basin.

An image taken of Hope, caught on Friday 7 September. PHOTO: Australian Painted Snipe Information and Tracking Project

Matt said there isn't scientific certainty pointing to a particular reason for population decline, although he said habitat loss and feral predators like cats and foxes would have taken their toll.

However, he said numbers could have received a boost from increased wetland habitat created by a rare three La Niñas over five years in Australia. 

He hopes the trackers will help understand the bird's movement patterns and develop a path to conservation. 

"Because they are so dynamic - they arrive at sites one day and then they're gone at the next - we suspect that there's some sort of migratory pattern," he said.

"Those first two birds - Gloria and Marcelina - [tagged before the five in the Macquarie Marshes] have indicated what we speculated on, that there's some sort of north-south migration happening.

"As it gets cold in the southern range, they start heading north. They basically chase they warmer weather."

Bird-lovers can track the snipes' progress on the Australian Painted Snipe website.