Yellow-crowned Night-Heron, juvenile
Nyctanassa violacea
Yellow-crowned Night-Heron · Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge · 3 August 2025
A young Yellow-crowned Night-Heron standing stock-still in the marsh grass at Jamaica Bay, streaked brown rather than the adult's slate grey and cream. It is a heron of salt marsh and mangrove along the whole Atlantic and Gulf coast, and in New York it nests in the city's parks and cemeteries; a colony in a Queens street tree is one of the odder sights in the five boroughs.
Young night-herons take two to three years to reach full adult plumage. The species specialises on crabs and crayfish, cracking the shells with a bill built noticeably heavier than a similar-sized heron's.
Birds, insects, plants and other wildlife, mostly from Brooklyn, with some from further afield.
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