Scientific name: Porphyrio porphyrio (Linnaeus, 1758)
Bird group: Rails and Crakes
Field characters. 45-50 cm. Much larger than Common Coot and Common Moorhen and with longer legs. Upperparts and wings warm violet-blue; chest and foreneck deep blue; underparts black-blue; under tail-coverts white. Heavy bill, large shield at base of bill, legs and eyes bright red. Juvenile drab blue-grey with grey face and throat. Flies with dangling legs.
Voice. Has many rich and variable calls, merging into each other.
Distribution. Local and scarce resident.
Habitat. Frequents still or slow-flowing fresh or brackish waters with extensive or narrow belts of reeds, sedges, etc.
Food. Feeds on foot, taking mainly aquatic and semi-aquatic plant shoots, leaves, roots, flowers, and seeds. Climbs also in reeds and rushes to obtain their seeds. Bill is used to dig out rhizomes and to move gravel, etc. to obtain invertebrates.