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Purple Gallinule - Porphyrula martinica

purple gallinule

Characteristics
Range
Habitat
Diet
Life Cycle
Behavior

 Classification

 Phylum: Chordata
 Class: Aves
 Order: Gruiformes
 Family: Rallidae
 Genus:  Porphyrula

Purple Gallinule


ICUN Redlist - World Status: Least ConcernLeast Concern
    Audio Credit: xeno-canto.org Glauco Alves Pereira cc logo
  Characteristics
Purple GallinuleThe purple gallinule is a brightly colored marsh bird that is about the size of a chicken. It has blue and green feathers, long yellow legs, very long toes and a red bill with a yellow tip.

  Range
mapThe purple gallinule can be found in South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Texas, and Oklahoma. It winters on the Gulf Coast. It is also found in Central and South America and the West Indies.

  Habitat
Purple GallinuleThe purple gallinule lives in freshwater marshes with aquatic vegetation like lily pads and pickerelweed.

 
  Diet

Purple GallinuleThe purple gallinule eats a wide variety of foods including frogs, grasshoppers, dragonflies, spiders and water plants.

 

 


  Life Cycle
Purple GallinuleFemale purple gallinules lay six to ten eggs in a nest of dead tree stems and leaves. The nest is usually placed on a floating tussock, in a clump of sawgrass or in a thicket. Both parents incubate the eggs and feed the chicks. Purple gallinules perform a "changing of the guard" ceremony while they are nesting. One partner will bring the other partner incubating the eggs a leaf. The bird on the nest adds the leaf to the nest before turning incubation duties over to the other gallinule.

  Behavior
Purple GallinuleThe purple gallinule is not a very good flyer, but it is an excellent wader. It uses its long toes to distribute its weight, and it can even walk on lily pads.




 


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