adult

adult juvenile European distribution adult

Identification

Night Herons are relatively small stocky herons with broad rounded wings. The adults are mostly a delicate shade of grey showing a neat solid black saddle in flight. At close range you may see the gorgeous deep red of their eyes. Juvenile Night Herons are basically dark brown in colour but heavily marked with pale rain-drop shaped spots.

Habitat

Breeds and roosts in trees and bushes usually close to shallow, reed-fringed lakes, marshes or fishponds where they feed.

Behaviour

Typically they roost communally by day in trees such as willows not far from water. At dusk they then fly out singly to their feeding areas, often calling as they do so.

Migration

Birds migrate in July to September to tropical Africa, returning in March-April. Some birds (less than 1% of the population) winter around the Mediterranean.

This information is taken from the BirdFile on the appropriate BirdGuides DVD-ROM. As well as video and sounds, our CD- and DVD-ROMs contain additional text on Voice, Sexing, Ageing, Food, Nests and Eggs and more.

For the purposes of our bird news services, Night Heron is classed as Scarce: broadly speaking, species that are covered in British Birds' annual review of scarce species (and forms of similar rarity).

Alicante, Valencia, Spain 11/07/2010	Tokyo Port Wild Bird Park, Ooi, Tokyo, Honshu, Japan 22/08/2010	Abu Nakhla, Al Rayyan, Qatar 20/08/2010	Abu Nakhla, Ar Rayyan, Qatar 20/08/2010	Abu Nakhla, Ar Rayyan, Qatar 20/08/2010
Abu Nakhla, Ar Rayyan, Qatar 20/08/2010	Abu Nakhla, Al Rayyan, Qatar 20/08/2010	Abu Nakhla, Ad Dawhah, Qatar 06/08/2010	Al Rayyan, Qatar 07/08/2010	Carska bara, North Banat, Serbia 01/08/2010

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Night Heron breeds in the following countries (Bird News Extra subscribers will see population statistics and information on trends for each country):

Albania
Armenia
Austria
Azerbaijan
Belarus
Belgium
Bosnia and Herzegovina
Bulgaria
Croatia
Czech Republic
France
Georgia
Germany
Greece
Hungary
Italy
Macedonia
Moldova
Netherlands
Poland
Portugal
Romania
Russia
Serbia and Montenegro
Slovakia
Slovenia
Spain
Turkey
Ukraine

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