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An illustration based on the real animal.
A little discovery to share.
Eurasian coots run across the water to take off.
THE REAL WORLD
The real Eurasian coot
- Scientific name
- Fulica atra
- Japanese name
- オオバン
- Group
- Birds
- Class
- Aves
- Order
- Gruiformes
- Family
- Rallidae
- Genus
- Fulica
It lives on ponds and lakes in Japan, Europe and elsewhere, and piles up dry grass among reeds to build a plate-shaped nest.
Its toes have leaf-shaped flaps called lobes, which help it when swimming and when walking on mud.
It eats water plants and aquatic insects, and sometimes dives to the bottom to catch shellfish.
How the Eurasian coot lives
It also grazes in pastures or on lawns near the water. Both the father and the mother incubate the eggs. Newly hatched chicks have black bodies and reddish heads. Outside the breeding season, it lives in large groups.
Museums VictoriaZoo SzegedBasic data
- Size
- Total length: about 39 cm
- Diet
- Aquatic plant leaves, stems and seeds, and small animals such as insects and shellfish
- Range
- Japan, Asia, Europe, North Africa, and Australia
Where the Eurasian coot has been recorded
Records: GBIF.org (CC0 and CC BY 4.0 records, retrieved 2026-11-07). Map: Natural EarthSee the records on GBIF
Watch wild animals from a distance. Do not touch or feed them, and take care of the places where they live.
Names around the world
- 日本語
- オオバン
- 简体中文
- 白骨顶
- 繁體中文
- 骨頂雞
- 한국어
- 물닭
- Español
- Focha común
- Français
- Foulque macroule
- Deutsch
- Blässhuhn
- Português (Brasil)
- Galeirão-comum
- Italiano
- Folaga comune
- हिन्दी
- दसारी
- العربية
- غرة أوراسية
- Bahasa Indonesia
- Mandar hitam
- Tiếng Việt
- Sâm cầm
- Русский
- Лысуха
- Türkçe
- Sakarmeke
- ไทย
- นกคู้ต
- বাংলা
- ইউরেশীয় কুট
Names come from Wikidata and iNaturalist records. Where a language has no recorded name, we use the scientific name.
Sources and how we check
- 井の頭自然文化園 — オオバンChecked: 2026-11-03
- Zoo Szeged — Eurasian CootChecked: 2026-11-06
- Museums Victoria — Fulica atra, Eurasian CootChecked: 2026-11-06
We check each fact against its source. The illustrations simplify how the real animal looks.
The classification (class, order, family, genus) follows Wikidata records, checked against GBIF. Classifications can change as research goes on.
The basic data are the values given in each source. They vary with how the animal is measured, whether it is male or female, and whether it lives in the wild or in captivity.
This page was translated from the original Japanese with the help of AI.
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