CLAPPER RAIL

In Texas Clapper Rails are residents of coastal salt marshes thickly grown to rushes, reeds or Spartina grass (Oberholser 1974). In Arizona where these rails breed along the Colorado River, more than 95% of breeding evidence for the Yuma Clapper Rail (R. l. yumanensis) came from freshwater lakes, reservoirs and marshes edged with cattails and other emergent vegetation. This subspecies is the only population not breeding in saltwater (Eddleman and Conway 1998, Wise-Gervais 2005).