tags: Night Heron, Black-crowned Night-heron, Nycticorax nycticorax,birds, mystery bird, bird ID quiz
[Mystery bird] Black-crowned Night-heron, sometimes known just as the Night Heron, Nycticorax nycticorax, photographed in California. [I will identify this bird for you in 48 hours]
Image: Steve Duncan, January 2010 [larger view].
Nikon D200 w/ Nikkor 300mm f/4 & TC17E.
Please name at least one field mark that supports your identification.
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The red iris and dark "crown" are indicative. Don't let the latin name fool you, this is no raven.
I love the baleful eye. And the scientific name makes me think Linnaeus had a stutter.
black crowned night heron... one of my favourite photos - http://www.flickr.com/photos/parkgallery/3468840119/sizes/o/in/set-7215…
Initial impression was that it was some sort of penguin. But yep, black-crowned night heron. Red eye, black crown and back, dark bill. Interesting to note that this species is so widespread; it's also found here in Singapore.
Had to google to see if America had a different species than Eurasia, but yes, I'll also say Nycticorax nycticorax ('cos of the red eye, the dark bill and the black crown and back).
Hey António/Hai-Ren,
But let's not forget about subspecies which in this case do differentiate between birds seen in the Americas (subspecies hoactli) versus Singapore (nyctocorax) or elsewhere (obscurus found from northern Chile and central Argentina south to Tierra del Fuego, and falklandicus found only on the Falkland Islands)
I guess the only other information we can glean from this photo is the minimal age of this individual.
As described by the Patuxent Wildlife Research Center, because this species only acquires adult plumage in it's third year, this individual must be at least 3 years old as first year birds are similar to juveniles (i.e. with yellowish eyes not red, a yellow base to the bill, brown head), and second year birds resemble the adult, but have a brown neck and wings contrasting with darker brown cap...
Differentiating between genders is probably not discernible based on observation alone as you can see in this photo of a breeding pair
WOW, I'm late to the game today, but that's just a gorgeous picture!
There's one lake I know of in the twin cities (MN) where a lot of them hang out. Long Lake in New Brighton. I haven't seen more than an occasional one anywhere else around here.
Hey Grrl, I have interesting pic of same bird in Central Park!