I have a friend who just emailed me to say that he saw a water rail (is that how you spell it?). The first time it had a baby and rather worryingly the following day it was without it. In all the years he has lived in Surrey he has never come across one. I had a quick look up on the web and it appears that they actually are quite common.
Does anyone know if they are protected or under threat or are they actually common? Seems odd that they would be when he is an avid wildlife spotter and has never come across one before.
Water Rails are very shy and secretive most of the time. They are very vocal though and sound like a squealing piglet when they call. I doubt very much your friend saw a 'baby' one! Its february! Water Rails wont have young until end of April at the very earliest.
Heres one in the hand:
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Nice photo Paul!
Most of the Rails will be heard, rather than seen.
I was exceptionally lucky one year to see a Sora at my local park (Big Soos Creek)--and I saw it at a time when they were not supposed to be around!
I've heard Soras calling, and also heard Virginia Rails. I have yet to actually SEE a Virginia Rail, and I've been birding more years than I care to admit to.
Kingfisher
Ive seen two Sora's in the UK. One in Nottinghamshire and one on the Scillies. Nice birds. Heres a digi-scoped shot of the Scillies one.
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we see lots of water rails on local marshes they love getting in the reed beds along the dykes they fly like a water hen with long legs trailing behind there body, they are very hard to see when in the reeds.
Great photos! I've never been lucky enough to see one, I can imagine that they are very well camouflaged in the reeds, so you must be quite lucky to see them.
Visit the RSPB Conway reserve, you can watch water rail from the visitor centre.
Water Rails are very shy and secretive most of the time. They are very vocal though and sound like a squealing piglet when they call. I doubt very much your friend saw a 'baby' one! Its february! Water Rails wont have young until end of April at the very earliest.
Heres one in the hand:
Is that your hand Paul? 
I am Jane’s friend who mailed her about the water rail. I have a picture that I took through the kitchen window, but I need to find out how to upload it.
In reply to Paul’s comments, about being mistaken about seeing the chick in February, I also did not believe I had seen a chick at this time of year. But, seeing it for the second time, legging it down the stream for cover under some overhanging grasses, even I had to believe it. This was not in February, as Paul assumed, but the beginning of the second week in January!! So it must have hatched very early January. As for being shy and secretive, well yes, it is, but it is still only 20 feet from the door of the house and I see it daily through the window, picking through the silt for food.
Sadly the chick disappeared after some heavy storms we had and the stream really rises dramatically, but the mink we have could well have been the culprit, as they have decimated the pond and stream wildlife significantly. Duck and moorhen didn’t nest last year, they came and had a look, mallard started to lay, but that was it, water voles seem absent sadly last year too. But it’s the water birds I miss the most, the mallard chicks coming for a meal by the back door along with pheasants and a water rat all together feeding!! Highly amusing.
It’s a bit of a zoo sometimes but one I would not change. Although I slightly objected to mink sharing the house at one point, it chewed its way through a felted timber wall before tiling was put up and inhabited between ceiling and upstairs floor, oh the smell!!! It had to go........
That would be incredible if it was a chick, and it sounds like it is. There is instructions on how to upload images in the FAQ section of the website but I don't have the link handy right this second.
It is a real annoyance having mink around, I hope they didn't get the chick. I think I would mind having it in the wall too!
The last couple of weeks in January makes it even less of a chance of it being a chick! Egg laying in Water Rails in Britain begins last week in March, incubation 19-22 days and then the young dont fledge for another 20- 30 days. It wouldn't just be increible, it would be a first for science! What makes you think it was a 'baby' anyway? What exactly did it look like?