Calayan rail
The Calayan rail (Gallirallus calayanensis) is a flightless bird of the rail, moorhen, and coot family (Rallidae) that inhabits Calayan Island in the Philippines. Though well known to natives of the island as the "piding", it was first observed by ornithologist Carmela Española in May 2004 and the discovery was officially announced on August 16, 2004. The formal description as a species new to science appeared in the journal Forktail (Allen et al. 2004).
| Calayan rail | |
|---|---|
Scientific classification  | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Aves |
| Order: | Gruiformes |
| Family: | Rallidae |
| Genus: | Gallirallus |
| Species: | G. calayanensis |
| Binomial name | |
| Gallirallus calayanensis D. Allen, C. Oliveros, C. Espanola G. Broad & J. C. T. Gonzalez, 2004 | |
The Calayan rail is one of the 20 known extant flightless rails. It is small and dark brown, with a distinctive orange-red bill and legs, and utters loud, harsh calls. Its habitat seems to be restricted to forests on coralline limestone areas on Calayan and extends to a total of less than 100 km². Biologists estimate that there may be 200 pairs on the island.
It is one of the two extant species of the genus Gallirallus along with the weka of New Zealand. All other species in the genus were distributed throughout many Pacific islands but were wiped out in the Quarternary extinction event. Many extant rails were also formerly classified in the genus, but most have since been moved to the genus Hypotaenidia.[2]
References
- BirdLife International (2012). "Gallirallus calayanensis". IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. 2012. Retrieved 26 November 2013.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
- "Flufftails, finfoots, rails, trumpeters, cranes, limpkin – IOC World Bird List". Retrieved 2020-12-21.
- Allen, Desmond, Carl Oliveros, Carmela Espaňola, Genevieve Broad and Juan Carlos T. Gonzalez (2004) A new species of Gallirallus from Calayan island, Philippines Forktail Vol. 20 pp. 1–7