Department of Wildlife and Fisheries Sciences, Texas A&M University, College Station, Texas 77843 USA On 17 February 1972 Donald Baker, then an undergraduate in the Department of Wildlife and Fish- eries Sciences, Texas A&M University, caught a small rail in one of his traps for furbearers, along a stream south of College Station, Brazos County, in east-central Texas. The bird was brought to me and subsequently identified as a Paint-billed Crake (Neocrex erythrops), a Sora-sized South American rail. The specimen, a male weighing 51 g, was prepared as a skin and partial skeleton and deposited in the Texas Cooperative Wildlife Collections (No. 8930), Texas A&M University. Meyer de Schauensee (1970) gives the range for Neocrex erythrops (sensu lato) as Columbia and Venzuela south through Brazil to Paraguay, Argentina, and Peru. Wetmore (1967) regards the north- western populations (from Colombia west of the Andes and northwestern Ecuador) as a distinct species, N. columbinaus, and describes the single specimen known from central Carribbean Panama as a new subspecies, N. c. ripleyi. Harris (1973) records Neocrex erythrops from the Galapagos Islands, and it occurs widely in South America east of the Andes from Colombia eastward and southward. In examining specimens of Neocrex, the Texas specimen resembles material from the Galapagos Islands, i.e., Neocrex erythrops; it has the slate gray flanks barred with white, and the more open nostrils (Wetmore 1967). Storrs Olson has examined this specimen and concurs (in litt.) that it is from the erythrops rather than the columbianus group of populations. As the occurrence of a single bird this far out of its range is both unusual and unexpected, I have attempted to locate a possible source from zoos and importers. No public zoo in Texas, nor the Audubon Park in New Orleans, Louisiana, the Cincinnati Zoo, Ohio, the St. Louis Zoological Gardens, Missouri, or the Lincoln Park Zoological Gardens, Chicago, Illinois have kept any South American rails. Inquiries to several major importers were also negative; according to F. M. Thompson (in litt.), the species has not been available. Finally, I checked the listings of birds imported into the United States for the years 1968-1971, as published by the Fish and Wildlife Service (Banks 1970, Banks and Clapp 1972, Clapp and Banks 1973a, 1973b). No Neocrex rails are included in these four listings. It is impossible to eliminate every potential source of an escaped bird, whether brought into this country illegally or imported under some other name. However, most of the Rallidae on the import lists are large or brightly colored species, including coots, gallinules, and wood-rails. It is improbable that a person would smuggle into the country a small, secretive, and relatively dull-colored rail such as Neocrex erythrops. The possibility of natural occurrence cannot be dismissed, no matter how zoogeographically unlikely. The Texas bird was in good condition and showed no obvious signs of recent captivity (e.g., no noticeable feather wear, bill or toe deformities, and the soft part colors match published descriptions). Certainly, had the bird been in captivity, it had escaped some months prior to its demise and apparently had travelled some distance. Further, as a group, rails are noted for appearing in odd places (see Peters 1934: 157-213, for extralimital records and for the many oceanic islands inhabited by members of the family Rallidae). It is important, I believe, to record the occurrence of such unusual individuals; the credibility of these extralimital records may later be confirmed by similar occurrences. Finally, I suggest that a method of marking/banding imported birds at the point of importation needs to be implemented immediately. Such a program would eliminate doubt in future cases of unusual, extralimital occurrences in the United States. I thank Ned K. Johnson, Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, for loan of Neocrex specimens, and $torrs Olson for his comments on this record. George H. Lowery, Jr., commented on an earlier draft of this paper. This is contribution number TA 13738 from the Texas Agricultural Experiment Station. LITERATURE CITED BANKS, R. C. 1970. Birds imported into the United States in 1968. Fish Wildl. Serv., Spec. Sci. Rep. Wildl. 136. , & R. B. CLAPP. 1972. Birds imported into the United States in 1969. U.S. Fish Wildl. Serv., Spec. Sci. Rep. Wildl. 128. CLAPP, R. B., & R. C. BANKS. 1973a. Birds imported into the United States in 1970. U.S. Fish Wildl. Serv., Spec. Sci. Rep. Wildl. 164. ß 1973b. Birds imported into the United States in 1971. U.S. Fish Wildl. Serv., Spec. Sci. Rep. Wildl. 170. HARRIS, M.P. 1973. The Galapagos avifauna. Condor 75: 265-278. MEYER DE SCHAUENSEE, R. 1970. A guide to the birds of South America. Narbeth, Penn., Livingston Publ. Co. PETERS, J. L. 1934. Birds of the world. vol. II. Cambridge, Mass., Harvard Univ. Press. WETMORE, m. 1967. Further systematic notes on the avifauna of Panama. Proc. Biol. Soc. Washington 80: 229-242. Received 12 October 1977, accepted 25 November 1977.