BAILLON'S CRAKE. 



Porzana bailloni (Vieillot). 

 Plate 59. 



Baillon's Crake is only an occasional visitant to our islands, and although 

 very irregular in its appearances, has been known to breed in Cambridgeshire and 

 in Norfolk, visiting the latter county more often than other parts of England. It 

 is very rare in Scotland, and still more so in Ireland. 



The home of this species is in Central and Southern Europe, also Asia Minor, 

 Asia, Africa, and Madagascar. 



The late Lord Lilford says {Coloured Figures of the Birds of the British 

 Islands): "In general habits this Crake much resembles the better-known Spotted 

 Crake, but it is decidedly more aquatic and less often met with in open marsh-lands 

 than that bird. The nests that we found were always concealed amongst the dense 

 masses of reeds and sedge that fringe and often conceal the runs of fresh water 

 that meander through the vast open ' marisma ' — a district that in rainy seasons or 

 very high tides is frequently entirely submerged. The nests that I examined were 

 exact miniature copies of those of the common Water-Hen, being loosely composed 

 of reed-leaves, flags, and sedge. The usual full complement of eggs was seven ; but 

 we occasionally met with five or six partially ' set,' and, in one instance, with eight. 

 These eggs vary in colour from a very pale green to a dark olive ground, but are 

 always very closely streaked and spotted with brown." 



In disposition this bird is extremely shy, and will hardly leave the protection of 

 the dense reed-coverts among which it lives. 



The food consists chiefly of insects and their larvae, and its call-note is said to 

 resemble that of the Little Crake. 



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