This is a guide to rails, a relatively homogenous family of birds spread throughout the world. Most species are solitary and somewhat secretive, and therefore high on the wanted lists of many birders, but the moorhens and coots are generally common and familiar birds of wetlands. A number of species are flightless and confined to small islands, and several are extinct as a result of man and introduced predators.

Illustrated by: Ber van Perlo