I’ve been back to the third pond a cross from North Mountain Park, armed with camera.  Twice I have failed to see the Sora again. No surprise.

“Rails are curious creatures.  Unbirdlike, they are fleet on foot and clumsy in the air; they keep to the thick of marshes, where they live their lives unseen.  Chicken-like…they are awkward, undeveloped-looking creatures that nonetheless are the very wiliest of birds.  Rails are prowlers in places of mud and shadow, slinkers in the reeds and grass, jittery non-descripts that shrink from viewe and slip silenty away.”      –SHADOWBIRDS,  by William Burt.

The Sora, porzana carolina, is less than nine inches long (almost tailless) and weighs less than three ounces.  The one I saw in the pond next ot Bear Creek was swimming.  They paddle about, but are not divers like a Bufflehead or grebe. Unlike the Virginia Rail, or Clapper, the Sora has modest, cootish beak.  In adults the beak is yellowish and this was a mature bird I saw briefly.  Blackish face, yellow beak.

The rails are widespread in America, esp. the Sora and Virginia, but are not often seen.  Like Mountain Quail, they are most often seen fleetingly and accidentally, not because an observer deliberately set out to find the rail.  I do know there are super high tides when the saltmarsh-lover, the large Clapper Rail, can be looked for and found on purpose.  Ditto the coastal wintering Black Rails.  The Sora likes densely overgrown freshwater marshes or coastal brackish marshes. 

Here’s some of the BNA’s description of the Sora: “Soras feed primarily on seeds of wetland plants and on invertebrates. Wild rice is a favorite food in late summer and fall. Although appearing to be weak and reluctant fliers, Soras migrate hundreds of kilometers each spring and fall between breeding and wintering wetlands.”

Sora are legally hunted in 31 states and 2 Canadian provinces but nobody keeps a count.  The range maps I;ve consulted maintain that the bird I saw will NOT winter in the Bear Creek Vallye but head further south.  Flying AWKWARDLY but with a goodly wingspan of 14 inches.

Again, from the BNA: “It is more often heard than seen and gives one of the most distinctive calls of any marsh bird, a loud descending whinny call: whee-hee-hee-hee-hee-hee .” 

The Sora does have a laugh that would make an Acorn Woodpecker jealous.  And when you hear it come from the tules, you stop and stare and find no source.