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Corn Crake

Crex crexOrder: GRUIFORMESFamily: Rails and Coots (Rallidae)

Corn Crake Portrait
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Related Birds

Clapper Rail
Sora

General

Corn Crake: Medium-sized rail, buff-yellow overall with brown-barred flanks, conspicuous chestnut wing patch, gray head and neck with dark crown, and yellow bill. Sexes are similar. Juvenile is duller and lacks gray on head and neck.

Range and Habitat

Corn Crake: Very rare fall visitor to the east coast, but sightings have dropped significantly as European populations have declined.

Listen to Call

Voice Text

"crex-crex"

Interesting Facts

  • Corncrake is a misnomer - birds rarely nest in cornfields. Favourite sites are in long grass and amongst tall weeds and damp places.
  • Towards the end of the 19th century their population had started to decline as machine mowing of hay started. The hay was cut early so that the birds were unable to raise their young.
  • The "crex-crex" sound of the corncrake has been compared with two cheese-graters rubbed together, producing a sound so monotonous as to qualify the bird as the world's worst singer
  • A group of corn crakes are collectively known as a "bowl", "box", and "cob" of crakes.


Author

Gary Owen Dick

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Bird Call Credits: The Macaulay Library of Natural Sounds at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. Martyn Stewart, http://www.naturesound.org, Redmond, Washington USA. The reuse or copying of bird calls in this database is strictly forbidden.
Family
Species Crex crex
Length8.6 - 9.8 Inches
Wingspan18.7 Inches

Corn Crake

Corn Crake: Medium rail, buff-yellow overall with brown-barred flanks, conspicuous chestnut wing patch, gray head and neck with dark crown, yellow bill. Eats worms, insects, snails, slugs, sometimes seeds and grains. Weak flight with legs dangling, drops back into vegetation after a short distance.

● Song: "crex-crex"

● Foraging & Feeding: Corn Crake: Very active feeder but normally stays within dense grasses and meadow vegetation as it hunts for a wide variety of insects, invertebrates, clams, and small vertebrates. Also consumes some foliage and seeds.

● Breeding & nesting: Corn Crake: Nest is a shallow cup built among dense grasses or vegetation in meadows. Lays eight to twelve pale green eggs with red brown spots. Eggs and chicks tended only by female, while male may mate with additional females. Incubation 16 to 19 days. Chicks begin flying when 34 to 38 days old.

● Similar species: Corn Crake: Sora juvenile is slightly smaller, lacks chestnut wing patch, chestnut-brown back lacks distinctive mottling, and white undertail coverts lack barring.

Flight Pattern

Flight is weak and flappy with legs dangling.
Corn Crake Body Illustration
● Range & Habitat: Corn Crake: Very rare fall visitor to the east coast, but sightings have dropped significantly as European populations have declined.
BreedingSolitary nester, Polyandrous
Population
MigrationMigratory
Weight6 Ounces