Nothing in nature is impossible, in no way am saying what you saw is not a European woodcock.
In the late stage of migration is when the adult females come and they are larger and darker than the early migrants which start with the juvenile males first then progress until the adults in the last stages.
I have done the F&W wing survey for 30 years and have kept the report on age and sex of the wings i and my son send them and it bears this out.
When we hunt after Nov 1 we try and not shoot these obviously larger birds knowing they are sucessfull breeders but are not always able to tell in thick cover.
You may find that right now in the area of Vermont you hunt that it is the tail end and the ones you will find will be the large females.
There are a number of good sources of information online giving info on sexing and aging the birds you take and it is very interesting to do so. All the birds taken our first trip the second week of Oct were juveniles.(6)
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