Rallus limicola

What a morning to drop in on the Mono County Park. I walked straight out to the end of the boardwalk and stumbled upon a family of Virginia Rails: two diligently foraging parents and their five peeping downy black chicks, crawling furtively about the reeds. Rails are super secretive and can be very hard to find any time of the year. I've heard this species far more often than I've seen it, and never with newly hatched chicks. I can't deny that it's moments like this that really stand out among the countless hours I stare at birds.

My 2 hours watching them yielded very few discernible images; this is really the best one of the adult's face. I've put up a nice one of a chick on Flickr, as well as a moment during which the parents were allopreening (preening one another as an expression of pair bonding) and a chick was close by. Relatively little is understood about the lives of the North American rails, because they are so secretive, so to witness such interesting parenting and bonding behavior was especially fulfilling.

Also earlier today: the still unblipped Western Wood Pewee, at Lee Vining Creek, and a Cliff Swallow in its nest at the Mono Basin National Forest Visitor's Center.