Rails, Gallinules and Coots (Rallidae)

Clapper Rail (Rallus longirostris) - HBW 3, p. 167

French: Râle gris German: Klapperralle Spanish: Rascón Piquilargo

Taxonomy: Rallus longirostris Boddaert, 1783, Cayenne, French Guiana.
This largely saltwater and brackish water species is often considered conspecific with the largely freshwater-marsh R. elegans; provisionally treated as forming superspecies. Californian races levipes, obsoletus and yumanensis sometimes placed in R. elegans; race tenuirostris of R. elegans sometimes transferred to present species. Hybridization with R. elegans occurs occasionally in areas of sympatry, and mitochondrial DNA studies of the two species have yielded inconclusive results. Twenty-one subspecies currently recognized.

Subspecies and Distribution:

obsoletus Ridgway, 1874 - C California, mainly in San Francisco Bay.
levipes Bangs, 1899 - coastal C California to N Baja California.
yumanensis Dickey, 1923 - SE California, S Arizona and NW Mexico.

See all 21 subspecies

obsoletus Ridgway, 1874 - C California, mainly in San Francisco Bay.
levipes Bangs, 1899 - coastal C California to N Baja California.
yumanensis Dickey, 1923 - SE California, S Arizona and NW Mexico.
beldingi Ridgway, 1882 - S Baja California.
crepitans Gmelin, 1789 - coastal Connecticut S to NE North Carolina.
waynei Brewster, 1899 - coastal SE North Carolina to E Florida.
saturatus Ridgway, 1880 - Gulf coast from SW Alabama to extreme NE Mexico (Tamaulipas).
pallidus Nelson, 1905 - coastal Yucatán (SE Mexico).
grossi Paynter, 1950 - Quintana Roo (SE Mexico).
belizensis Oberholser, 1937 - Ycacos Lagoon, Belize.
scotti Sennett, 1888 - coastal Florida.
insularum W. S. Brooks, 1920 - Florida Keys.
coryi Maynard, 1887 - Bahamas.
leucophaeus Todd, 1913 - I of Pines (Cuba).
caribaeus Ridgway, 1880 - Cuba to Puerto Rico and Lesser Antilles E to Antigua, also Guadeloupe.
cypereti Taczanowski, 1877 - coasts from extreme SW Colombia (Nariño) through Ecuador to extreme NW Peru (Tumbes).
phelpsi Wetmore, 1941 - extreme NE Colombia and extreme NW Venezuela.
margaritae Zimmer & Phelps, 1944 - Margarita I (Venezuela).
pelodramus Oberholser, 1937 - Trinidad.
longirostris Boddaert, 1783 - coasts of Guyana, Surinam and French Guiana.
crassirostris Lawrence, 1871 - coastal Brazil from Amazon estuary to Santa Catarina.