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Ocellated Crake | Rufirallus schomburgkii
Schomburgks ral | Polluela ocelada
The Ocellated Crake is a small, rufous crake of dry and damp grasslands, which in the guide area occurs only in southern Costa Rica. It lives hidden in tall grass, rarely flushes and is almost only detected by voice. The main range lies far to the south, in northern and central South America.
Voice
A long series of rapid, soft, somewhat bubbling notes, which from a distance resembles a toad or an insect; also short, sharp calls. Calls mainly at dusk and at night, but also by day from cover.
Recording: Jacob Wijpkema — CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 · converted to mono · xeno-canto
Identification
14 cm, small and short-tailed, with a short, dark bill. Head, neck and breast are warm rufous, the throat paler. The upperparts are dark brown with small white, black-edged spots on the back and wings. The flanks and undertail are barred black and white, the belly paler brown. The legs are reddish, the eye red to orange. Male and female are alike. Juveniles are duller, with less rufous on the head and breast.
Confusion species
Ruddy Crake Laterallus ruber does not occur in southern Costa Rica and lacks the white spots and barred flanks. White-throated Crake Laterallus albigularis has a white throat and a plain olive-brown back without spots. Grey-breasted Crake Laterallus exilis has a grey head and breast with a chestnut nape. Yellow-breasted Crake Laterallus flaviventer is smaller and paler, with a pale supercilium and yellow legs.
Habitat
Tall grass in savannas, wet and dry grasslands and rough, unmown pastures, often in places that become wet in the rainy season; in the guide area in the lowlands and low hills. Forages for insects and seeds on the ground under dense grass and runs rather than flies. The nest is a domed structure of grass, low in a grass tussock.
Where the bird is most at home, classified by the vegetation units of Mexico and Central America.
Range and movements
In the guide area only in the southern Pacific part of Costa Rica, in the grasslands and savannas of the Térraba valley around Buenos Aires in Puntarenas province. Elsewhere in the guide area no regular sites are known. Outside the guide area in separate pockets from Venezuela and the Guianas to Brazil, Paraguay and eastern Bolivia.
- Resident
- dark = core range, pale = thinly spread
How and when to look
The best chance is in spring and at the start of the rainy season at grassy sites around Buenos Aires in southern Costa Rica, where birds call at dusk. A bird in the open is rare; anyone hoping to see rather than hear one waits quietly along a track through tall grass.
Conservation status
Not threatened; the species has a large but fragmented range in South America. In the guide area the population is small and confined to a single region, where the conversion of grassland to pineapple and other plantations is reducing its habitat.
Scientific name
Rufirallus schomburgkii | (Schomburgk, 1848)
Schomburgk described the species in 1848 as Crex Schomburgkii; because it was later moved to another genus, the author and year stand in brackets. The genus Rufirallus was introduced in 1856 by Bonaparte. Rufirallus combines Latin rufus 'rufous' with Rallus, the rail genus: 'rufous rail'. schomburgkii probably honours the German-British explorer Robert Hermann Schomburgk (1804–1865), who explored British Guiana; his brother Richard described the species. The specimen the first description was based on came from interior of Guyana.