With their slate grey backs, yellow tipped red beaks and oversized yellow legs, Moorhens are an easily identified bird of Europe, southern Asia and some parts of Africa. Alongside their obvious markings they also have a white strip along each side, white undersides to their tail and a red band at the top of each leg. They grow to weigh around 350grams and have a wingspan of just over 50cm.
Moorhens are sometimes also known as waterhens or swamp chickens and both names are fairly suitable. They are almost always seen on or near to fresh and brackish waterways. Despite not having webbed feet, they are fairly accomplished swimmers and are capable of diving beneath the surface to avoid danger or in search of food. Most of the time their food comes from on top of the water or close to the waters edge. This includes snails, insects and fish but also berries, grain and apparently mixed bird seed.
Moorhens begin nesting from mid march when a pair will begin constructing several nests amongst waterside vegetation and occasionally in branches that overhang the water. These nests are made out of twigs and grasses and once complete the female choses one within which to lay her eggs. For the first nesting attempt she will lay from 5 to 8 eggs that are cream with dark splotches and measure around 43mm in length. Both parents incubate the eggs for 3 weeks until the chicks hatch out. At first they are covered in a layer of black down apart from the tops of their heads and their wings which are fluffless. They are precocial which means they can leave the nest almost straight after hatching. Their parents keep a close eye on them and bring them food whilst also showing them what to eat for themselves. After 3 weeks the young are able to find most of their own food and after 7 weeks they are capable of flight and in theory could leave their parents territory to start their own lives. However, this isn’t what happens. Instead of the teenage birds leaving, they stay in their parents territory and help them to rear their next batch of offspring. And if that wasn’t complicated enough, studies have shown that sometimes moorhens exhibit cooperative breeding where multiple females will pair up with one male and rear all of their eggs and young together. In most years moorhens will have 2 clutches of eggs but if the weather is suitable of if their nesting attempts fail early, they can attempt a third clutch.
Moorhens have a couple of interesting ways of showing how fit they are. For example, their constantly flicking tail is thought to be a sign to predators that they are alert and active and research has shown that the birds that flick their tails more often are actually the healthier individuals. When it comes to showing how fit they are to one another, this is where the moorhens brightly coloured beak comes into play. It takes a lot of energy to maintain these colours and exposes the animal to more risk of predation so the birds with the most vibrant colours are showing themselves to be in great condition to potential mates and competition.
Moorhens in the UK usually don’t migrate and remain in their territories throughout the year but in the winter they are joined by migrant birds from northern Europe who have migrated to our shores to escape the harshest weather in Germany, Denmark and the Netherlands. Their numbers across Europe have remained fairly stable since 1980 but in the UK they have dropped quite significantly. There are currently around 540,000 moorhens in the country.
They have an average lifespan of 3 years but oldest known bird died in 2020 just short of its 12th birthday at 11 years, 11 months and 27 days old.
#birds #nature #britishwildlife
Some of the footage and images in this video were obtained using creative commons licences. Here are the originals and licence details:
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egg image by steve p2008 is marked with CC BY 2.0.
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