CRANES,RAILS AND COOTS

BLACKNECKED CRANE
SIZE; Vulture; long-legged, standing 150 cm (5 feet) to top of head.
FIELD CHARACTERS; a typical ashy gray crane with black head and neck. Lore's and entire crown naked and dull red (v. merely a nape patch in common crane). A small patch of white feathers below and behind eye. Wing-quills black, the inner secondaries elongated into arching plumes falling over and concealing the black tail.
SEXES; Alike; female slightly smaller.
STATUS, HABITAT, ETC; Regular winter visitor in small numbers to Bhutan and arunchal Pardesh (Subansiri frontier division)-recorded in the Bumthang and Apa Tani valleys, 1500-3000 m. Breeds in Tibetan Plateau country between 4300 and 4600 m. In the above wintering areas affects fallow paddy fields and swampy land-sedentary flocks of 20 to 40.
FOOD; grains, seeds, shoots, tubers, insects.
CALL; loud, high-pitched trumpeting of Sarus pattern in uneven chorus, accompanied by the typical prancing and capering.

ELWES'S CRAKE
SIZE; Grey Quail-like chestnut and gray marsh bird. Above, head and neck dark ashy gray; rest of upper plumage rufous-brown. Below, chin whitish; lower plumage dark ashy gray.
SEXES; Alike.
STATUS, HABITAT, ETC; Resident. Duars and upto at least 2800 m (Bhutan); reported at 3600 m (sikkim). Affects dense swampy jungle, often bording paddy field. Great sulkers, emerging to feed at the edge of cover early mornings and evening, scuttling in on least alarm.
FOOD; Insects, mollusks, worms, seeds of marsh plants.
CALL; Unrecorded.

WHITEBREASTED WATERHEN
SIZE; Grey Partridges; length 30 cm (12 in).
FIELD CHARACTERS; a slate-colored stub-tailed swamp bird with prominent white; crown, hind neck, and rest of upper plumage dark slaty grey. Below, chin to vent pure white; sides of breast, and flanks gray; posterior flanks and under tail-coverts rufous.
SEXES, Alike.
STATUS, HABITAT, ETC; Resident. Duars and foothills upto 1500 m; reedy and scrub-covered wetland, edges of flooded rice field, and ponds and ditches. Constantly jerks up the stumpy tail while sauntering about in search of food, flashing the chestnut under tail-coverts. Clambers freely up into bamboo clups and shrubs. Flight feeble and typically rail-like, with legs dangling. Swims buoyantly.
FOOD; Insects, mollusks, worms, shoots and seeds of marsh plants.
CALL; silent except in breeding season when very noisy. Loud, raucous croaks and chuckles followed by long runs (may be 15 minutes or more) of a monotonous metallic krrkwaak-kwaak-krrkwaak-kwaak, etc., or just kook…kook…kook…. like Coppersmith barbet's, chiefly during night and on cloudy overcast days.

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