Corncrake

Traonach | Crex crex

‘Though there is no lonesome corncrake's cry Or sorrow and delight You can hear the cars And the shouts from bars And the laughter and the fights’.

Lyrics from the song ‘Lullaby of London’ by The Pogues

Only within the last 40 years, the Corncrake has gone from one of Ireland’s most common summer visitors to amongst the rarest. The number of returning summer migrants has been in sharp decline since the late 1980s. Formerly extremely common on Ireland’s Rathlin Island, in 1989, Corncrakes stopped regularly returning along their usual migratory route from Africa to this location to breed during the summer months. There are a number of reasons for the Corncrakes rapid decline. They are groundnesting birds, meaning that they are particularly vulnerable to mammalian predators, especially mink and stoats. Furthermore, their breeding has been severely impacted by grass cutting for farming purposes. In order for the Corncrake to remain a breeding bird in Ireland, the sympathetic management of grassland is imperative. Corncrakes live only 2 years on average, with young birds having an extremely low survival rate.

Corncrakes are shy and elusive birds, their distinctive call often being the only indication of their presence. Though Corncrakes may seem like gamebirds due to their compact bodies, short tails, long necks and small heads, they are actually members of the rail family of birds. Other, more common members of this family are the Coot and the Moorhen. Adult male Corncrakes show a brown, streaked crown, blueish-grey cheeks and a chestnut eye stripe. Their necks are grey, fading into whiter underparts with chestnut barring. The sides of their necks are more intricately patterned with darker brown speckles, merging into bold stripes at the back of the neck. Their long, pink legs are sturdy looking and their feet are large. The Corncrake’s wing feathers are the boldest element of their plumage, chestnut brown mostly, with dark brown, almost black steaks or blotches in centre of each feather. Corncrakes often look tail-less because their tails are extremely short, only composed of a few feathers. Adult females have less grey in their plumage and their legs are usually a dull brown as opposed to pink. Both sexes have short but sturdy-looking pink beaks. Corncrakes are one of Ireland’s most unique birds as they prefer to run from danger rather than fly away. It is extremely rare to see a Corncrake in flight.

The summer call of the male Corncrake, a distinctive, loud and rasping krex krex, repeated several times, is nowhere near as common a feature of the Irish countryside as it once was. This call is so unique amongst birds that they were, usually, given the onomatopoeic scientific Latin name Crex Crex. Corncrakes tend to be more active at night, calling from meadows beneath thick cover. Corncrakes feed on the seeds of plants usually, but will also take invertebrates.

In Irish folklore, it was believed that Corncrakes transformed into Moorhens in the winter months. This belief arose due to a lack of understating of the migratory nature of these birds. We now know that the Corncrake’s plumage does not change and its appearance does not transform in winter, it is just simply not here.