Amaurornis olivacea
In 3 days ~10% in a week ~20%
The pale-vented bush-hen or rufous-tailed bush-hen (Amaurornis moluccana) is a medium sized waterbird, mainly blue-grey with a buff vent and undertail. It is found in Australia, the Moluccan Islands, New Guinea, the Bismarck Archipelago and the Solomon Islands. Its natural habitat is subtropical or tropical moist lowland forests.
The pale-vented bush-hen is a member of the family Rallidae which includes crakes and rails. The genus name Amaurornis (Reichenbach 1853) is from the Greek for dark, shadowy or dim, amauros, and bird, ornis. The species name Amaurornis moluccana (Wallace, 1865) means "Moluccan dark and shadowy bird" and relates its original discovery in the Moluccan Islands, Indonesia. The term pale-vented came into use in the late 1990s as a descriptive term, when the species of bush hens in Australia and New Guinea were separated from the Plain Bush-hen (A. olivaceus) endemic to the Philippines.
It is widely known in Australia as simply "bush-hen" but has also been known as rufous-tailed or rufous-vented rail, crake or moorhen or brown rail. Gould believed he had found a new species, Gallinula ruficrissa in 1869 giving it the common name of... Wikipedia →
| # | Park | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Daintree National Park | 🇦🇺 Australia | |
| 2 | Noosa National Park | 🇦🇺 Australia | |
| 3 | Raja Ampat | 🇮🇩 Indonesia |
| # | City | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Davao City | 🇵🇭 Philippines | |
| 2 | Brisbane | 🇦🇺 Australia | |
| 3 | Manila | 🇵🇭 Philippines |
Rare
Under 5% of wildlife watchers report a Rufous-tailed Bush-hen sighting in Brisbane on a given day, based on 582 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data. It is the 116th most-seen of the 237 birds we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to about 10%, and over a week to about 20%, if each day is a fresh chance.
March
In that month about 10% of wildlife watchers report a Rufous-tailed Bush-hen in Brisbane on a given day, against under 5% in April to February, the lowest months. That is one of Brisbane's wettest months, with about 140 mm of rain against 40 mm in July.
Between 5 and 8 am
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Rufous-tailed Bush-hen sightings with a recorded time, and about 8 in 10 of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is a daytime animal.
Among the best
Of the 3 cities where we can rate Rufous-tailed Bush-hen sightings, Brisbane ranks 2nd at under 5%, level with the leaders once rounded. The best odds are in Davao City (Philippines, under 5%).
Same family: Rallidae
The closest relatives of the Rufous-tailed Bush-hen that you can see in Brisbane (family Rallidae, Rails, Gallinules, and Coots) are Dusky Moorhen (about 60%), South-west Pacific Swamphen (about 50%) and Eurasian Coot (about 20%), with each one's daily chance of a sighting.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Rufous-tailed Bush-hen is recorded against all the birds logged in Brisbane (582 verified sightings), calibrated against known sighting rates. Figures are rounded to the nearest 10% because citizen-science data supports honest approximations, not decimals, and months with records from fewer than five people show "—". How it works.
