Black Tailed Native Hens Poem by Francis Duggan

Always by water bordered by scrub they reside
And when humans or predators approach them they run off to hide
Into the thick scrub where they cannot be seen
These rails with pink feet, black tails and brown bodies and bills of light green.

Black tailed native hens the name people by them know
To the size of a small bantam the adults do grow
And they do look like bantams so hens for them an apt name
Though bantams unlike them are easy to tame.

And to bantams not related in any way at all
Distinct in their nature and distinct in their call
Black tailed native hens are of the rail family
They are nomadic birds them one often don't see.

In any one place their's is not a long stay
The wanderlust is in them they soon fly away
For to live by a distant lake for a brief while
In their short life span they travel many a mile.