Renowned bird author Dominic Couzens asks whether the Moorhen is the UK’s “most interesting bird?”
Is this commonly-seen backwater species the most exciting ‘unexciting’ bird around? It certainly boasts some interesting characteristics…
It’s a preposterous thing to say, perhaps, but there are grounds for believing that the Moorhen is the most interesting bird in Britain. This might seem to be a ridiculous proposition. After all, the Moorhen doesn’t do anything spectacular. It wanders over the grass, swims very badly, makes a lot of clucking sounds and flashes its white undertail coverts. Its most frightening rapturing manoeuvre is to turn over a floating leaf suddenly to see what is lurking on the underside.
Its most animated displays are its fights, in which individuals clash breast-to-breast, kicking each other and, if they are floating, making a lot of splashing. It is more amusing than amazing, and if the clash was reported by football pundits, they might describe it as “handbags.” It looks too silly to be serious, but spats can last a long time and birds will sometimes attempt to drown each other.
However, even if we find Moorhens unexciting, we can at least admit that they are successful. Almost every moist backwater has at least a pair of Moorhens (the origin of the name is ‘Mere-hen’), and they are common wherever the combination of freshwater and reasonably dense waterside vegetation meet. At this time of year, in the midwinter, Moorhens live in loose flocks of anywhere between single figures and 30 birds, but in favourable habitat, such as a densely vegetated canal, birds will stay put on a territory all year.
What’s a Moorhen doing there?
One of the few times that a Moorhen might startle a birder into a flicker of interest is, when, out of the blue, one appears up in a tree. The birder invariably thinks: “Good heavens, I didn’t expect to see a Moorhen up there!” However, this is perfectly usual, especially at night, when Moorhens will retreat to the safety of elevated branches to roost, as equally incongruous Pheasants or Peacocks will. In the autumn and winter, Moorhens will also take berries with the best of them, including competing with Blackbirds and Greenfinches for Yews, rose-hips, Hawthorn and Ivy. It is part of a wide-ranging diet.
If Moorhens had webbing between their toes, climbing up trees would be much more difficult. However, they don’t. They are members of the rail family, not ducks. The lack of webbing does affect their swimming, which is effective enough, but always looks hilariously laboured. There is a great nodding of the head as the bird progresses, not necessarily in time with the forward stroke, as if the effort
was exhausting and the swimmer was navigating through treacle.
If you were cruel, you might say that Moorhens were fairly useless at everything – not just climbing and swimming, but flying, too. It is true that their flight also looks awkward and laboured, particularly when they take off with much spluttering and fuss. Yet they are perfectly capable of significant flights, such as over the English Channel or North Sea, which they do at night. It is better to look at a Moorhen as an all-rounder, quite good at everything. It would obtain a clutch of GCSEs, but maybe not excel in any.
One thing that Moorhens do with alacrity is to flick their brilliant white undertails. Sometimes they do this to signal to other
Moorhens – indeed, turning their back and lifting the tail is an aggressive act.
However, it has been shown that rear-end-flicking has a different reader of the signal in mind – a predator. The more exposed a Moorhen feels, or the nearer something dangerous is, the faster the rate of uplifting its tail becomes. The Moorhen is letting the predator know it is alert, healthy and ready to flee if necessary.
It so happens that Moorhens signal their health in other ways, too, by both the orange and waxy-yellow coloration on the bill. The brighter the colours, the healthier the bird is, which can be useful information in the breeding season. If you look closely at a Moorhen, you might also notice the thin red ‘garter’ at the top of the legs – this must surely give a similar message.
Another signal of fitness is the size of the frontal shield, as it is for the Moorhen’s relative, the Coot, and to be honest, this is the deal-breaker. In a winter flock, those with large frontal shields are dominant over those less well endowed. Apparently, females prefer small, plump males more than anything, so long as the frontal shield is up to scratch. I don’t know about you, but I find the female preference for small stature and less than perfect streamlining rather cheering.
The pair enters into what might be termed a ‘complicated’ breeding season. The fascinating range of behaviours is what lies at the heart of my assertion at the start that Moorhens are seriously interesting birds. You might as well take a bird biology book, read the section on reproduction and Moorhens will do it.
Firstly, Moorhens are frequent parasites of their own kind, behaving in a Cuckoolite fashion, laying their eggs in the nests of their neighbouring conspecifics. Putting up eggs for adoption by reluctant foster parents is a great way to boost your productivity, and it often works well. Moorhens are not particularly strong in the counting department (as well as flying, swimming etc.), and should a bird come back to the nest to find an extra egg, it isn’t always sure of how many eggs it left when last there.
The trouble is, destroying or removing an egg that might be someone else’s is a considerable risk to your own productivity, so most Moorhens play safe.
Nest and mate sharing
More surprisingly, a few Moorhens occasionally go in for the nuclear, son-ofCuckoo parasitic option, and lay extra eggs in the nests of other species. Coots are their most frequent hosts, although the latter do have a nasty habit of killing any extra chicks that they cannot feed, so the fate of the foisted egg could be dodgy. Bizarrely, in the Mediterranean, Moorhens occasionally lay in the nests of Little Bitterns. The latter are good candidates for colonisation of Britain in the next few years, to the Somerset Levels and beyond. The last thing these beautiful herons would like to meet is an exploitative native.
Secondly, there is a degree of nest sharing, and mate sharing. Two females
THE MORE EXPOSED A MOORHEN FEELS, OR THE NEARER SOMETHING DANGEROUS IS, THE FASTER THE RATE OF UPLIFTING ITS TAIL BECOMES
will sometimes use the same nest, each contributing to the clutch. In such a system, it is apparently common for both females to be inseminated by the same male. The twist is that the females are sometimes mother and daughter and the attendant male is the younger females’ father!
The other variation in breeding strategy is a much more wholesome one. Moorhens will often have more than one brood in a year (in South Africa, pairs have been known to carry on producing clutches ad nauseam, regardless of the season). When this happens, a pair will appreciate having some extra help in feeding the next set of chicks. Not only do siblings from their earlier clutch frequently chip in, but apparently sometimes some complete strangers do as well.
From the above, you can see that nothing is entirely straightforward in the Moorhen’s breeding life. But look a little closer and you will see a pattern. The Moorhen is a master of nothing, but able to pursue multiple options. Omnivorous by nature, amphibious by shape, it is multilocular in breeding strategy. It is the multitasking, multifaceted marvel of the marshes.