It is often confused with the purple swamphen and the Eurasian coot due to similar appearance and overlapping distributions.

John Gould described the dusky moorhen in 1846 from a skin collected along the Murray River in South Australia.

[3] The adult dusky moorhen is mainly dark grey-black, with a browner tinge to the upper parts.

[3] During autumn and winter, the colour of the frontal shield grows duller in females and young males.

Its diet consists of seeds, the tips of shrubs and grasses, algae, fruits, molluscs, and other invertebrates.

[6][7][8] The chicks are fed mostly on annelid worms and molluscs, with plant matter gradually being given in increasing proportions by the parents as the young mature.

Swimming and preening birds may make a series of short, stacatto, widely spaced noises.

Adults also make short clicking noises when separated from chicks, and the young give a series of descending whistles in response.

[8][5] They are also found in urban parks such as Gold Coast Regional Botanic Gardens and often in dams and river banks.

[17] They usually live in low-lying areas, although a pair have been found as high up as 1,580 metres in New Guinea, likely having been separated from their flock.

[18] Dusky moorhens are diurnal, and roost at nighttime alone, in breeding groups, or in non-breeding flocks.