Great Egret, Ardea alba
Great Egret, Ardea alba egretta. Bird photographed in greater Los Cabos area, Baja California Sur, December 2019. Photograph courtesy of Dr. Tom Bartol, Carlsbad, California.
Great Egret, Ardea alba egretta. Birds photographed in the greater Los Cabos area, Baja California, January 2018.
Great Egret, Ardea alba egretta. Photograph taken in the greater Zihuantanejo area, Guerrero, January 2020. Photograph and identification courtesy of Ron Woheau, Zihuantanejo.
Great Egret, Ardea alba egretta. Birds photographed in the greater Mexico City area, March 2021. Photographs and identification courtesy of Marina Sutormina, Stockholm, Sweden.
Great Egret, Ardea alba egretta. Bird photographed on the beach in Salina Cruz, Oaxaca, March 2021. Photograph and identification courtesy of Marina Sutormina, Stockholm, Sweden.
Great Egret, Ardea alba egretta. Photograph taken in the coastal area of Yavaros, Sonora, March 2019. Photograph and identification courtesy of David F Smith, Alamos, Sonora.
Great Egret, Ardea alba egretta. Photograph taken in the coastal area of Yavaros, Sonora, December 2019. Photograph and identification courtesy of David F Smith, Alamos, Sonora.
Great Egret, Ardea alba egretta. Photograph taken within the Florida Everglades, South Florida, October 2022. Photograph and identification courtesy of Faith Hubsch, Fort Lauderdale, Florida.
The Great Egret, Ardae alba egretta, is one of four subspecies of Great Egret, and the only one found in Mexico. They are a member of the Ardeidae Family of Herons, Egrets and Bitterns, which has sixty-eight members placed in eighteen genera, and one of twelve global species of the Ardea Genus. They are also known as the American Egret, the Common Egret, the Great White Egret and the Great White Heron.
The Great Egret is elegant and large in stature. They have dazzling all white plumage with long black legs and feet, a long neck and an all yellow bill. Their iris is yellow, and their legs and feet are black. During breeding season they develop long plumes that extend beyond the tail, elongated feathers on the lower neck and breast and their bill becomes orange-yellow, and their lores and eye-ring lime green.
The Great Egret inhabit freshwater, estuarine, and marine wetlands both inland and along the coasts including marshes, floodplains, river margins, lake shores, fishponds, estuaries, coastal swamps mangroves and mudflats, as-well-as agricultural land, at elevations up to 4,000 m (13,00 feet). They feed as solitary individuals or in groups mainly consuming small fish and invertebrates including crustaceans, amphibians, birds, crustaceans, small mammals, and reptiles. They nest in colonies in woody vegetation, shrubs, and trees in both freshwater wetlands and marine-estuarine habitats with other Great Egrets and other water birds.
Ardae alba egretta is a year found resident and found throughout Mexico.
The Great Egret can be easily confused with the Great Blue Heron, Ardae Herodias occidentalis (found only in south Florida, pinkish-yellow legs and feet) and the Reddish Egret, Egretta rufescens (bicolored bill, dark-bluish legs).
From a conservation perspective the Great Egret is currently considered to be of Least Concern with stable, widely distributed populations. They were overhunted in the early 20th century, which decimated their populations which sparked the formation of conservation and environmental organizations, including the National Audubon Society. They have quickly recovered from previous population decimations which is attributed to their adaptability. Their long term survival is threatened by the presence of pesticides and herbicides within their aquatic environments and the destruction of coastal marine habitat.