Birds of the Upper Cumberland Region: Species Accounts

Virginia Rail (Rallus limicola)

Abundance: Rare; 14 records in 10 Regional counties, 3 in Kentucky and 7 in Tennessee (Map of UCR Distribution); data from the Regional bird-monitoring efforts are too few to determine a trend in the populations migrating through, summering in, and wintering in the Region (see also Regional Bird-Monitoring Plan).

Status: Permanent Resident; Occasional Transient during spring (3 records, 1 of which merges with 1 of the summer records); Rare Transient during fall (10 records, 1 of which is probably a continuation of a summer record and 2 of which merge with winter records); Occasional Summer Resident (2 records, each of which merges with either a spring or fall record); and Occasional Winter Resident (3 records, 2 of which merge with fall records); categorized as a Permanent Resident in Tennessee by Nicholson (1997) but not so categorized in Kentucky by Palmer-Ball (1996); photographs (see links below).

Regional High Count: 2 (several records below).

Information on Records:

21 October 1966 (1) Center, Metcalfe County, Kentucky (James Hiser fide Russell Starr; Starr 1967), captured unharmed by farmer during mowing of a "semi-swampy" (Starr 1967: 38) field.

21 October 1978 (1) Catoosa Wildlife Management Area, Cumberland County, Tennessee (Tom Laughlin, Rick Phillips; Bierly 1979a).

21/22 October 1983 (1—specimen of tower-killed adult [JBE notes]) WGRB-TV tower, near Columbia, Adair County, Kentucky (Jackie B. Elmore, Sr.; Stamm 1984a), tower casualty.

23 April–13 June 2003 (1) Pumphouse Pond, Pulaski County, Kentucky (Roseanna M. Denton, m. ob.; Palmer-Ball and McNeeley 2003a, 2003b), a spring and summer record.

1 & 20 July/25 September 2004 (1) Heritage Marsh, White County, Tennessee (Stephen J. Stedman, Douglas A. Downs; Casteel 2004d and 2005a), a summer and fall record.

5 October 2004 (1—adult) National Fish Hatchery, Celina, Clay County, Tennessee (Terry M. Campbell photo).

6 September 2005 (1—specimen of immature) Hickory Avenue near 4th St., Cookeville, Putnam County, Tennessee (Ivan L. Cordrey), probable road or wire casualty; photo [of specimen, now housed in the bird collection at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga] (9 September 2005, Stephen J. Stedman).

4 May 2007 (1 or 2) Pumphrey Farm, Pulaski County, Kentucky (Roseanna M. Denton, C. Gay Hodges).

21 November/29 December 2009 (2/1—calling in response to iPod recording) wet area at Fentress County Industrial Park 1.5 km east of Clarkrange on north side of Rt. 62, Fentress County, Tennessee (Edmund K. LeGrand, Stephen J. Stedman/Edmund K. LeGrand), a Christmas BirdBlitz record on the latter date.

22 October 2011–18 February 2012 (1—heard only) Pumphouse Pond, Pulaski County, Kentucky (Roseanna Denton et al.).

5 April 2013 (1—heard only) Wastewater Treatment Retention Pond, Fall Creek Falls State Park, Van Buren County, Tennessee (Edmund K. LeGrand).

26 October 2013 (1—heard only) Wastewater Treatment Retention Pond, Fall Creek Falls State Park, Van Buren County, Tennessee (Stephen J. Stedman).

19 December 2015 (2—heard only) White County, Tennessee (Edmund K. LeGrand), a CBC record.

8 October 2016 (1—killed by cat) Students Home Rd., DeKalb County, Tennessee (Judy C. Fuson photo).

Regional Extreme Dates:

    Fall: 6 September 2005 (Putnam County, Tennessee; Ivan L. Cordrey)–21 November 2009 (Fentress County, Tennessee; Edmund K. LeGrand, Stephen J. Stedman), but 3 winter records exist.

    Spring: 5 April 2013 (Van Buren County, Tennessee; Edmund K. LeGrand)–13 June 2003 (Pulaski County, Kentucky; Roseanna M. Denton; Palmer-Ball and McNeeley 2003b), but 2 July records exist, and the late record may represent a breeding event.

YardWatch Results 2003 and 2004: No registrations.

Breeding: Possible (Recent).  No conclusive evidence is available, but circumstantial evidence suggests the possibility of breeding at two sites within the Region.  The record from Pulaski County, Kentucky, clearly falls across most of the breeding season of this inconspicuous species. The record from White County, Tennessee, while falling later than most nesting records in Tennessee, is also much earlier than most records of fall migrants.

Habitat: Wetlands of many types and sizes.  Pumphouse Pond in Pulaski County, Kentucky, is a smallish wetland (c. 2–3 hectares) dominated by cattails and possessing quite a bit of open water, while in 2004 the Heritage Marsh in White County, Tennessee, was a very large (c. 50 hectares) wetland dominated by smartweed and cutgrass and containing very little open water.

Remarks: The paucity of migration records of this rail probably derives from a lack of effort to find it rather than from its absence during the migration seasons.  Two winter season records in 2 Regional counties are known from the Region, so the Virginia should eventually be recorded during that season in other counties.

    A record of a Virginia Rail purportedly occurring in Putnam County, Tennessee (Alsop undated [1980]; Stedman 1993), is erroneous, the undoubted result of a mapping error.  The Cumberland County, Tennessee, record of Virginia Rail (Bierly 1979a) is not reflected in Alsop's map despite the fact that the Cumberland County record antedates the publication of Alsop (undated [1980]).  Although the observers of the Cumberland County Virginia Rail—Tom Laughlin and Rick Phillips—also assisted in the preparation of Alsop (undated [1980]), it is still probable that their sighting was attributed, inadvertently, to Putnam County, rather than to Cumberland County, in the process of preparing the maps for that work.

Check-lists of Birds for the Counties of the UCR

Check-lists of the birds of each county of the Upper Cumberland Region may be viewed by clicking on the links below. For each county, there are two check-lists: one list that shows the species that have been observed and where possible documented in the county within the larger list for the entire Region; and one list that includes only the species observed in the county with annotations for the date and observers for at least one sighting (the ultimate goal of the latter list will be to include annotations for the very first known Regional observation of each species in that county; this goal is probably one that will take many years to complete, if completion is even a possibility). To see if the species discussed in this species account has been observed in a county, click below or click on the link for the Map of UCR Distribution near the top of the page.

Check-lists of Birds for Some Public Access Birding Sites of the UCR

Check-lists of the birds of some public access birding sites within the Upper Cumberland Region may be viewed via the links below. To see if the species dealt with in this species account has been observed within any of these sites, click on the appropriate link below. See the pages for each county within the Gazetteer for links to additional smaller public access birding sites with check-lists in progress.

Literature Cited