A day before Typhoon Champi put Guam in Condition of Readiness 1, what Jessica Laguaña mistook for a chicken ended up being a rare sighting of an Australasian swamphen.
Laguaña was driving in Ordot to check on her in-laws when she noticed the bird near their driveway. Its striking blue-purple feathers caught her attention, prompting her to take a photo.
“I was so captivated by the blue on its chest. The bird was coming up the driveway, and it seemed like it wasn’t afraid of me. I walked by it, and it just kept going up the driveway.” Laguaña said her father-in-law leaves bird feed for the local birds in the area, and that it might have been around the area before. She said her father-in-law had seen the bird a few times prior to Typhoon Champi.
The bird’s bright red bill and oversized red frontal shield also distinguish it from Guam’s pulattat bird, or common morehen.
Avian biologist Martin Kastner said the bird can be confidently identified as the Australasian swamphen, although a similar-looking black-backed swamphen cannot be ruled out completely.
Swamphens are generally sedentary, but can disperse between islands. Kastner said the bird’s appearance on Guam is unusual, and it remains unclear whether more will be seen.
“So if this is the only bird on island, which is possible, then we might not see them very often, and it could be a one-off,” Kastner said.
Guam has no known subfossil records of its own due to the cave damage on Guam during the war. However, swamphen subfossils have been found on Rota and Tinian, suggesting the birds may have once inhabited the Marianas.
The nearest population is in Palau, where a rare endemic subspecies known as the Uek lives in marshes and taro patches and its protected by local custom.
For now, the swamphen’s origins remain a mystery. Kastner said it will be interesting to see whether any more appear on Guam.
