Black-crowned Night-Heron
Nycticorax nycticorax
Black-crowned Night-Heron · Everglades National Park · 6 February 2026
A Black-crowned Night-Heron at the water's edge in the Everglades in late-afternoon light, which is a stroke of luck: true to the name, they do most of their hunting around dusk and after dark. It is a heron of marsh and mangrove on every continent but Antarctica and Australia, and the Everglades hold them in every slough.
Built differently from the long-necked herons and egrets around it: a stocky, short-necked, hunch-shouldered shape suited to standing motionless at the water's edge rather than the active wading of a Tricolored or Little Blue. The red eye and black cap and back against pale grey wings are adult plumage; a young bird is streaky brown all over and takes a few years to reach this.
Birds, insects, plants and other wildlife, mostly from Brooklyn, with some from further afield.
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