The Lagging Landrail
Whenever we flush a landrail we wonder that so slovenly a bird should be able to cross seas in migration. One doubts its ability to cross a wide river. Those who for the first time see a landrail rise might be excused for supposing it to be wounded—the long legs trail at full length, hardly clearing the heads of the clover which forms its favourite cover. Few birds are so slow in flight, certainly no other game-birds—if it is entitled to be classed with them, because, as for woodcock and snipe, a game licence is required before it may be taken. Beaters have surprised themselves by bagging landrails with sticks and partridge carriers, and we have known a clever retriever to catch a landrail in the air. In spite of her wide experience, the dog mistook the landrail for a wounded bird when it rose, in its heavy way, some twenty yards before her, while she quested for a partridge. As if in revenge for having been fooled, she gave furious chase, and retrieved it. Flushed in a gale of wind, a landrail will make some progress, though its flight at first is rather suggestive of a wind-driven leaf. But after a time the flight grows stronger, as though the wings had worked off some stiffness. No bird seems less willing to be seen than the landrail. Yet it will make itself heard almost continuously from the first streak of dawn until darkness. Its harsh-toned "Crake, crake, crake," seems close at hand at one moment, then far away, suggesting that the bird is swift enough on its legs, if slow in flight. It does not travel far, having arrived from its over-sea journey, haunting, as a rule, one chosen field, where it is seen only by the mower, who may accidentally wound the close-crouching bird with his scythe. Landrails seem to become more scarce every year, and this is often put down to the mowing machine, which it is claimed is more fatal to sitting birds than the scythe. But birds usually run from their nests before the approach of the noisy, whirring machines, and, if they are caught, seldom suffer more than a cut leg; whereas the scythe comes upon them almost unawares, and strikes fatally. Probably some influences bearing upon the migration of landrails have more to do with their scarcity than unnatural destruction. Hiding so closely in the grass or the corn, landrails seem to have every chance of long life in this country.
