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The symbol of the National Audubon Society, the graceful great egret inhabits every continent but Antarctica. In the Americas, it can be found from Canada to Argentina in streams, lakes, ponds, mud flats, marshes, swamps, and other wetlands. Sometimes confused with the white morph of the great blue heron, the great egret may be distinguished by its black legs and feet. It is also somewhat smaller, measuring 52 to 57 inches from wingtip to wingtip and weighing on average 35.3 ounces. Juveniles and nonbreeding adults have yellow bills. As mating season approaches, adult bills turn a black-auburn color and intensify to an orange color, and they grow long plumes.
A wading bird, the great egret dines mostly on fish, mollusks, insects, birds, small mammals, and plants. Though it usually stands and waits in the water to snatch prey with its bill, it also sometimes slowly and patiently stalks its food. A solitary hunter, the bird is a social nester, usually breeding in colonies. Nests are platforms of sticks, built in trees or reed beds. Females lay 2 to 5 eggs, which both parents incubate for 25 to 26 days. Sibling rivalry is intense and brutal, larger siblings often killing smaller nest mates. Those large or wily enough to survive, fly within 6 weeks and live around 15 years in the wild.
In the United States, great egret populations were decimated in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Indiscriminate hunting for feathers reduced populations by more than 95 percent. The National Audubon Society, which was formed to protect birds from plume-hunting, and other groups helped force protections, and the bird has recovered quite well. Global populations are estimated to be as large as almost 2 million individuals.
Nature picture credits (left to right): (left) Egret with her hatchlings © Thomas Duane; (right): By pond © Keith Lazelle.
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