nightjar

Any of about 65 species of night-hunting birds. They have wide, bristly mouths for catching flying insects. Their distinctive calls have earned them such names as ‘whippoorwill’ and ‘church-will's-widow’. Some US species are called nighthawks. (Family Caprimulgidae, order Caprimulgiformes.)

The name ‘nighthawk’ most commonly refers to the Chordeiles species of North America, including Chordeiles minor which breeds widely as far north as southern Alaska, and migrates south to Argentina.

The whippoorwill of North America (Caprimulgus vociferus) measures about 10 in/25 cm in length, and is mottled gray-brown.

A new species was discovered in Ethiopia 1994. All that was found was a decomposing wing, on the basis of which the new species was named Caprimulgus solala (solus ala is Latin for one wing).