Virginia Rail

Rallus limicola

Order GRUIFORMES - Family RALLIDAE

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1. Cool Facts
2. Description
3. Similar Species
4. Sound
5. Range
6. Habitat
7. Food
8. Behavior
9. Reproduction
10. Conservation Status
11. Other Names

A secretive bird of freshwater marshes, the Virginia Rail most often remains hidden in dense vegetation. It possesses many adaptations for moving through its habitat, including a laterally compressed body, long toes, and flexible vertebrae.

Cool Facts

• The forehead feathers of the Virginia Rail are adapted to withstand wear from pushing through dense marsh vegetation.
• The Virginia Rail can swim under water, propelling itself with its wings. It swims in this way probably only to flee predators.

• The Virginia Rail and other rail species have the highest ratio of leg muscles to flight muscles of any birds.

• The Virginia Rail builds numerous "dummy nests" in addition to the one where eggs are actually laid.

Description

• Size: 20-27 cm (8-11 in)
• Wingspan: 32-38 cm (13-15 in)
• Weight: 65-95 g (2.29-3.35 ounces)

• Small, chicken-like marsh bird.
• Compact body.
• Short tail.
• Strong legs.
• Rufous throat and breast.
• Gray cheeks.
• Long, slightly curved red bill.

• Upperparts streaked black and rufous-brown.
• Barred black-and-white flanks.
• Eyes red.
• Legs red.

Sex Differences

Sexes similar; male slightly larger.

Immature

Downy chick black. Juvenile dull blackish brown on upperparts, with some rufous feather edges. Underparts densely marked with dark brown or blackish, face grayish brown, bill and legs dusky brownish.

Similar Species

• Clapper Rail and King Rail similarly marked, but much larger, with paler legs and bill, and more rufous, not distinctly gray, cheeks.

Sound

Long sequences of pig-like grunts. Also a repeated "kid-dik."

»listen to songs of this species

Range

Summer Range

Breeds in appropriate habitat from southern British Columbia to the maritime provinces, and from Baja California across the desert states and the Great Plains to Pennsylvania, New York, and New England, and southward along the Atlantic coast to North Carolina. Also breeds in Central and South America.

Winter Range

Winters along the coastlines from New Jersey and southern British Columbia to Mexico. Also in scattered localities in interior United States. Populations in Central and South America remain in breeding range year-round.

Habitat

Freshwater marshes; occasionally inhabits salt marshes. Lives in dense emergent vegetation.

Food

Insects, insect larvae, other aquatic invertebrates, fish, frogs, and small snakes.

Behavior

Foraging

Probes water and mud with bill.

Reproduction

Nest Type

Basket of loosely woven vegetation, often with a canopy, usually placed above shallow water.

Egg Description

White or buff with sparse irregular gray or brown spotting.

Clutch Size

4-13 eggs.

Condition at Hatching

Covered with black down, leave nest within one day. Fed by parents.

Conservation Status

Declining in some areas, but not protected by special designations or measures. Information on population trends is sparse.

Other Names

Râle de Virginie (French)
Rascón de agua (Spanish)

Sources used to construct this page:

Conway, C. J. 1995. Virginia Rail (Rallus limicola). In The Birds of North America, No. 173 (A. Poole and F. Gill, eds.). The Academy of Natural Sciences, Philadelphia, and The American Ornithologists? Union, Washington, D.C.