410 CLAPPER RAIL. 



CLAPPER RAIL. (Rallus crepitans) 



PLATE LXII.— Fig. 2. 



'Ant. Zool. No. 407. -Lath. Syn. iii. p. 229, No. %—Ind. Orn. p. 756, No. 2.— 

 PeaWs Museum, No. 4400. 



RALLUS CREPITANS.— Gmsim. 

 Rallus crepitans, Bonap. Synop. p. 333. 



This is a very numerous and well-known species, inhabiting 

 our whole Atlantic coast from New England to Florida. It 

 is designated by different names, such as the mud-hen, clapper 

 rail, meadow clapper, big rail, &c., &c. Though occasionally 

 found along the swampy shores and tide waters of our large 

 rivers, its principal residence is in the salt marshes. It is a 

 bird of pasage, arriving on the coast of New Jersey about the 

 20th of April, and retiring again late in September. I suspect 

 that many of them winter in the marshes of Georgia and 

 Florida, having heard them very numerous at the mouth of 

 Savannah river in the month of February. Coasters and 

 fishermen often hear them while on their migrations in spring, 

 generally a little before daybreak. The shores of New Jersey, 

 within the beach, consisting of an immense extent of flat 

 marsh, covered with a coarse reedy grass, and occasionally 

 overflowed by the sea, by which it is also cut up into innumer- 

 able islands by narrow inlets, seem to be the favourite breed- 

 ing place for these birds, as they are there acknowledged to be 

 more than double in number to all other marsh fowl. 



The clapper rail, or, as it is generally called, the mud-hen, 

 soon announces its arrival in the salt marshes by its loud, 

 harsh, and incessant cackling, which very much resembles 

 that of a guinea-fowl. This noise is most general during the 

 night, and is said to be always greatest before a storm. About 

 the 20th of May, they generally commence laying and building 

 at the same time ; the first egg being usually dropt in a slight 

 cavity, lined with a little dry grass pulled for the purpose, 



