Who is a quack. About herbs with love

Detachment - storks

Family - Herons

Genus/Species - Nycticorax nycticorax. common night heron

Basic data:

DIMENSIONS

Length: 58-65 cm.

Weight: around 500-700

BREEDING

Puberty: from 2-3 years old.

Nesting period: usually from April to July.

Carrying: 1 per season.

Number of eggs: 3-5.

Incubation: 21-23 days.

Feeding chicks: 6-7 weeks.

LIFESTYLE

Habits: common heron heron (see photo of the bird) sleeps and raises chicks in colonies.

Food: fish, insects.

Lifespan: up to 16 years old.

RELATED SPECIES

Close relatives of the common night heron are 3 other species of night heron: Nycticorax violceus, which lives in North and South America, N. leuconotus of Central and South Africa, and N. caledonicus from Australia.

The common night heron has a rather massive beak and short legs. She has a black back with a greenish metallic sheen, wings, body and tail are painted in grey colour and the belly is whitish. On the neck of this heron several long decorative feathers grow, which fall to the middle of the back. Young birds receive such an outfit for the second spring.

WHAT DOES IT FEED

Outside of the feeding period, when there is no need to worry about the ever-hungry chicks, the night heron goes to feed at dusk and early in the morning. Often, in search of food, the bird flies to more distant places, where it finds more prey. Here this heron roams leisurely in shallow water and catches careless fish. The night heron often climbs to the depths and swims, unlike, which, during the hunt, stands motionless in shallow water. The night herons are social birds, but they go hunting alone.

The food of this bird consists mainly of small fish, frogs, aquatic insects and their larvae. The common night heron often forages on land. Here insects, spiders, small rodents and even birds become its prey.

WHERE Dwells

The night heron is found all over the world except Australia and breeds in a variety of wet habitats. It very often appears on the banks of rivers overgrown with dense vegetation, flooded with water, areas overgrown with reeds, on ponds and near shallow lakes, streams and in marshy regions. The night heron can be found in sea bays, estuaries, and coastal brackish lakes. These birds prefer areas where tall trees grow. These herons nest on them and spend the night. Often, several dozen night-crowns spend the night on one tree. Non-European populations settle in mangrove forests. Here they live next door to the kaguya, which are very common in these areas. However, kaguya are active during the day, therefore, looking for food, these birds do not compete with each other. In many regions, night herons are migratory. Birds from North America fly to Central America for the winter. Asiatic night herons winter in Indonesia, while southern populations spend most of the year on nesting grounds.

BREEDING

The night heron is a social bird. They build nests in large colonies, very often the birds nest together with other heron species.

The mating ritual is started by a male common night heron. First, he finds a place for a nest and bravely defends it from rivals. Seeing the intruder, the male takes on a formidable look, stretches his neck forward, puffs up his feathers, thus showing who is the rightful owner of the site. Then he tilts his head and lets out a short croak, which is supposed to frighten the enemy. Paired birds greet each other, gently clapping their beaks and combing each other's feathers. The male builds the base of the nest from several branches, and when he manages to attract the female, he gives her branches, offering to continue building. The night heron's nest is a rather messy design. Birds use it for several years, each time completing and renovating the structure. These herons build a new nest only when other birds occupy their old nest.

Heron nests are located on trees or in thickets near the water. Often there are several nests on one tree at once. Sometimes the birds nest among the reeds. It is extremely rare that the night heron nests are located at a height of up to 45 m from the ground or far from water bodies. The female lays one egg every 48 hours. Full clutch contains 3-5 bluish-green eggs. The parents incubate them together. Incubation begins with the laying of the first egg. The first chick hatches in 3-4 weeks, and its younger brothers and sisters appear with a break of several days. Newborns are covered in dark brown plumage with creamy white spots and lighter undersides. Parents together feed the chicks with fish. At three weeks of age, the chicks leave the nest.

During the hunt, herons hold outstretched wings above the surface of the water - it is easier for birds to notice prey in the shadow of their wings.
Another name for the common night heron is the night heron.
In the UK, the common night heron is a very rare bird, but since 1951 a colony of these birds from North America has nested here.
When catching fish, herons use a rather interesting method. They throw a piece of food or a feather on the surface of the water and patiently wait for some fish to fall for this "bait" and swim up to the hunter.
The largest known colony of night herons was found in Virginia (USA). It numbered about 1,200 pairs of birds.

CHARACTERISTIC FEATURES OF QUAQUAA

Legs: middle length, short enough for storks. Most of the year they are light green, in the nesting period the color of the legs becomes light yellow.

Class - Birds / Subclass - New-palatine / Superorder - Storks

History of study

Common night heron, or night heron, is a bird of the heron family.

Spreading

The common night heron inhabits almost all of America, Africa, South and Central Europe and Asia. European night herons are migratory, wintering in Equatorial Africa. There is no ordinary night heron only in Australia. In Russia, a large number of nesting night herons can be found in the Volga delta.

Appearance

The night heron has a short neck compared to other herons and a short but strong and powerful beak. The legs are also shorter than those of other herons. The male in breeding plumage has a black cap with a greenish tint and a back of the same color. Wings are grey. The belly and sides are white. 2-4 long narrow white feathers grow on the back of the head in spring. The beak is black, the legs are yellow or pinkish with long toes. The female has a similar color. Young birds are dark brown with longitudinal streaks. Downy chicks are white.

reproduction

Night-crowns nest in colonies with other herons or their own colonies of up to a thousand pairs in trees or bushes. If the nesting site is far from human habitation, they can also nest on reed beds. The night heron builds a nest from small twigs, where the female lays 3-4 eggs. After 21 days, the chicks hatch, usually 1-2 days apart, in the order in which the eggs were laid. Both parents feed the chicks, first regurgitating half-digested food into their beaks. Later, when the chicks grow up, they begin to feed them with regular food.

Lifestyle

Night-crowns are active mainly in the mornings and evenings, during the day they sit motionless on a branch. However, during nesting time they are active during the day. They nest near densely overgrown reservoirs on the forest edge or in the forest.

In summer, 2-4 long feathers grow on the back of the head, in males they are about 5 cm longer than in females. In summer the beak is black, at other times it is black-gray with light edges. Eyes large, coral red in summer. Young birds vaguely resemble bitterns. They are brown with greyish-yellow streaks on each feather, the legs are green, and the eyes are yellow.

The yellowish throat also has brown longitudinal streaks. In the second summer, young birds can still be distinguished from older ones: their plumage is more dull, brownish, color contrasts are more blurred, and feather decorations are shorter.

Food

The night heron feeds mainly on fish and frogs, as well as aquatic insects.

Here is such a bird - the American green night heron (Green Heron) - a small marsh bird of the heron family that lives on the American continent. Here is such a lump. And you know, they say that 90% of her volume is occupied by the neck.

Here's what happens when she's surprised...

Photo 2.

Here is such a telescopic neck.

Photo 3.

Kwakwa- an overseas guest and a typical bird of the Indo-Malay fauna. In Russia, she lives in the Primorsky and Khabarovsk Territories. It nests even near Komsomolsk-on-Amur. Apparently, this is the northernmost finding of the night heron. Her favorite place of residence is river urems with lush vegetation, flooded with water. At dusk, when the night heron becomes more active, she freely makes her way in dense thickets near the water, tenaciously intercepting branches with her bony fingers. At the moment of danger, she, like a bittern, freezes motionless, staring unblinking evil eyes and stretching forward and up a long beak.

In open places, the night heron is rarely shown, and it is not often possible to see her, and even then in flight. In the air, she is very clumsy and unhurried.

Photo 4.

Most often green night heron it is possible to observe taking off from the shore or flying low over the river. Its dimensions during the flight approach the size of the yellow heron or are somewhat smaller. It flies rather quickly, often flaps its wings and does not retract its neck so much. Sitting on the shore and seeing an approaching person or boat, she first freezes, stretching her neck, and then moves a short distance along the shore. The heron again sits on the shallows under a steep bank on a root sticking out of the water, an overturned boat, on the lower or middle dry branch of a tree growing on the shore, but does not sit on the tops of trees. At the same time, the bird rarely rises higher than the trees growing on the banks and, as a rule, flies 15-20 meters above the water surface.

Photo 5.

Usually does not run across the ground, and it can probably be picked up where it sits. However, wounded in the wing, she runs with remarkable agility. In relation to a person green night heron behaves differently, depending on the circumstances, but is generally less cautious than large species of herons. The voice of a bird can be heard quite often during a calm flight or during takeoff. According to Menzbier (1916) it is like a short dull croak, which is certainly erroneous. Shulpin (1936) conveys it with the sound "tsik-tsik-tsik", which is also difficult to agree with. The bird's voice is high and sharp, it sounds like a sharp "tilk" or more often "tiuu". The bird is twilight, lives alone and in pairs, keeps in dense bushes along the banks of reservoirs.

Photo 6.

area. Extremely extensive. Birds inhabit the temperate, but mainly subtropical and tropical countries of Asia, Africa, America and Australia.

The nature of the stay. Sedentary species in southern latitudes and migratory in the northernmost parts of its range. Correct flights are characteristic of the birds inhabiting Japan, Sev. China, Korea and the USSR.

Biotope. The green night heron adheres to thickets along the banks of inland waters.

Subspecies and Variable Characters. There are many subspecies of the night heron. Some of them differ slightly, others, on the contrary, differ well in size, plumage color and details of biology.

Biotope. Shady coastal growths of vines, alders, bird cherry and other tree species framing the rivers. Birds especially willingly choose coastal thickets of river backwaters, heavily littered channels among numerous islands, where snags are found in abundance, trees washed away by water with an exposed root system and a forest brought here in high water, rafted along the river. Green herons adhere to these stations with great constancy. Here, sitting on roots exposed to water, on a snag or on a narrow shallow under a steeply dipping shore in fast-flowing water, it gets its own food.

Photo 7.

During the period of growing up chicks, these herons occasionally fly out of coastal thickets, visiting ditches, banks of ponds among villages located in close proximity to rivers. In marshes and stagnant water bodies far from rivers, it does not positively occur. In such habitats, herons live in separate pairs, and later in families, never forming colonial nesting sites in our country. In contrast, in Japan, the Amur green night heron breeds not only in separate pairs, but also in colonies of 3 to 10 pairs each (Yan, 1942). On the rivers flowing from the Sikhote-Alin ridge, it lives in the lower sections with a wide river valley and almost never enters the mountains. In the middle and southern parts of the country (for example, Iman), it often penetrates into mountain valleys.

population. On the Amur, the green night heron is not numerous. To the south, the number increases markedly and on the Ussuri the heron is very common and the more often the farther south. Most often found on Sungach. Rare along the lower Lef in the area of Spassk-Yakovlevsk. In the lower reaches of the Iman, for one kilometer along the river, from 1 to 3 pairs nest. In general, a rather numerous bird in its habitats, which populates quite densely.

reproduction. Nests are always arranged on trees (willow, apple, alder), sometimes hanging over the water surface, sometimes growing aside up to 30-35 meters from the shore. Nesting structures are located at different heights from the ground or water. When a nest is built above water, it can be placed very low (about 1.5-2 m above water), more often a little higher, occasionally at a height of 10-12 m. In most cases, nests are difficult to access. They are placed either on thin, criss-crossing vines that cannot support the weight of a person, or at the end of an apple tree branch, far from the trunk.

Photo 8.

The nests are similar in shape and arrangement of nest material to nests of other herons nesting in trees. Their shape is an inverted cone, sometimes with very steep, sometimes opposite, with gentle walls. Some thin branches diverge radially from the top of the cone, where they are fastened with a small amount of clay or bird droppings. The building is not dense, eggs are visible through the walls from the sides and from below. Nest sizes vary considerably. In some cases, they are not larger than nests of turtledoves ( Streptopelia orientalis), in others much more. The nest found on the Suifun had a diameter of 28 cm, with a tray depth of 6 cm (Shulpin, 1936). The nests we examined on Iman turned out to be much smaller. The largest of them had a transverse diameter of 19 cm. In a small nest tray, lateral eggs with a large clutch lay somewhat higher than the central ones. Few nests known to us contained clutches of 3 to 5 eggs. Finished clutches, judging by the dissections of nesting birds, apparently may contain 7 or even 8 eggs.

The timing of reproduction remains poorly understood. On Iman, the earliest unfinished clutch of 5 eggs was found on May 23rd. Considering that the bird lays the first 3 eggs daily, and the rest at large intervals, it can be assumed that laying began on May 16th. Nests with fresh eggs were also examined by us much later (before June 11). On the Suifun, a nest of 5 completely fresh eggs was found by Shulpin on June 4th. Eggs have a shell - pale blue, like a night heron, in color. Their shape varies greatly. Some of them are regular ovoid in shape, others are strongly elongated with equally rounded ends. They are smaller than the eggs of the night heron, little white heron, Egyptian heron, but somewhat larger than the yellow heron. The length of eggs from Iman and Sui-fun (26) is 37.4-43.0 mm x 29.0-31.1 mm, the average is 40.9 x 30.4 mm.

Photo 9.

Incubation begins after the first egg is laid. The bird sits little on the first laid eggs, and the size of embryos and chicks of one nest differs slightly. The participation of sexes in incubation is not known. Females were found on nests, while males stayed nearby. The female sitting on the nest lets the man very close. Having risen from the eggs, stretching out her neck and beak, she freezes in such a pose, typical for some herons, and flies off only when the observer shakes the branches of the nesting tree. Frightened from the nest, it returns relatively soon to the incubated eggs, but for a long time does not fly up to the nest, the laying of which has not yet been completed. The timing of incubation of eggs in green night herons has not been clarified. Apparently, like most herons, chicks in a short time acquire the ability to climb and fly. On the river A juvenile specimen was caught by Przhevalsky on July 12, and from the middle of July young specimens came across to him quite often (Shulpin, 1936).

The night-crown chicks that have flown out of the nests, together with the old people, continue to adhere to nesting sites for a long time. On Iman, an old female and three of her flying chicks were killed near an empty nest during the period from 24 to 29 August. Thus, the family stayed in the nesting area until the time of departure. Perhaps the departure itself occurs in families, and not in flocks, and therefore it is difficult to notice it. The main concern for feeding the chicks lies with the male.
At the end of June, males flying for food can often be seen not only at dusk, but also during the whole day.

The common night heron is a bird of the heron family. It lives almost all over the world, they are not only in Australia. Some night herons winter in Equatorial Africa.

In England, the night herons settled themselves - in the early sixties, a colony of birds from North America got there during the flight. Since then, they have returned every year. Of course, in the UK, the heron population is not numerous. In our country, they are settled in thickets of bushes on the banks of the Volga, on forest edges. The largest nesting area for the common night heron is in Virginia. It has one thousand two hundred pairs.

Compared to other representatives of its species, the bird is endowed with a shorter neck, legs and a powerful beak.

There is no sexual dimorphism - both females and males have a white-gray color, a black beak and yellow-pink legs. Three fingers point forward, one backwards. During the mating season, in the spring, the males grow several long white feathers and a black-green cap on the back of their heads. Young growth has a dark brown color, downy chicks are white. The color of an adult bird is acquired by the nightgrow after three years. Their body length is a little over sixty centimeters, the wingspan is usually a little more than a meter.

Birds are not active during the day, feeding and social life takes place in the early morning, evening or night. Therefore, a person rarely sees it. During the mating season and nesting, they hunt during the day. The nests of the common night heron number up to a thousand pairs. They often nest with herons of other species. These birds make nests from twigs in trees or on reeds if there is human habitation nearby.

Listen to the voice of the heron

It has been observed that sometimes night-crowns make their nests quite high above the ground, over forty meters, and at a decent distance from the water. Cases of removal of hunting grounds from the colony by twenty kilometers have been noted. Common night herons prefer to settle in swampy lowlands, on the overgrown shores of lakes, ponds and streams. They really like to hunt in the rice fields.

The herons are representatives of the herons.

The mating season begins in the spring. The place for the nest is chosen by the male, who drives away rivals from him, stretching his neck and making characteristic croaking sounds. Having chosen a female, he clicks his beak, affectionately touches her occipital feathers, and then makes the basis of a joint nest out of twigs. The female completes the house, but from those branches that a caring male brings. The nest of the night heron has been used for several years, each year completing it with new branches.

The females lay three or four blue-green eggs, from which blind chicks hatch after three weeks. They are looked after by both parents, in turn incubating the clutch, and regurgitating half-digested food to the chicks. Juveniles begin to fly after about a month, and mostly at night.

The night heron catch fish, it is their main diet, frogs, leeches, tadpoles, crustaceans, amphibians and insects. When hunting, she sits down on the lower branches of trees or bushes, tracks down prey and swoops down on it, diving into the water.

The common night heron is a nocturnal bird.

Tracking the prey, the night heron often moves during daylight hours, spreading its wings wide. In their shadow in the water, prey is better visible. Or he throws a bait on the surface of the reservoir - a piece of food or a feather, patiently waiting for the fish to bite on it.

Field signs. Most often green night heron it is possible to observe taking off from the shore or flying low over the river. Its dimensions during the flight approach the size of the yellow heron or are somewhat smaller. It flies rather quickly, often flaps its wings and does not retract its neck so much. Sitting on the shore and seeing an approaching person or boat, she first freezes, stretching her neck, and then moves a short distance along the shore. The heron again sits on the shallows under a steep bank on a root sticking out of the water, an overturned boat, on the lower or middle dry branch of a tree growing on the shore, but does not sit on the tops of trees. At the same time, the bird rarely rises higher than the trees growing on the banks and, as a rule, flies 15-20 meters above the water surface.

Usually does not run across the ground, and it can probably be picked up where it sits. However, wounded in the wing, she runs with remarkable agility. With regard to humans, the green heron behaves differently, depending on the circumstances, but is generally less cautious than large species of herons. The voice of a bird can be heard quite often during a calm flight or during takeoff. According to Menzbier (1916) it is like a short dull croak, which is certainly erroneous. Shulpin (1936) conveys it with the sound "tsik-tsik-tsik", which is also difficult to agree with. The bird's voice is high and sharp, it sounds like a sharp "tilk" or more often "tiuu". The bird is twilight, lives alone and in pairs, keeps in dense bushes along the banks of reservoirs.

area. Extremely extensive. Birds inhabit the temperate, but mainly subtropical and tropical countries of Asia, Africa, America and Australia.

Biotope. The green night heron adheres to thickets along the banks of inland waters.

Subspecies and Variable Characters. There are many subspecies of the night heron. Some of them differ slightly, others, on the contrary, differ well in size, plumage color and details of biology.

Incubation begins after the first egg is laid. The bird sits little on the first laid eggs, and the size of embryos and chicks of one nest differs slightly. The participation of sexes in incubation is not known. Females were found on nests, while males stayed nearby. The female sitting on the nest lets the man very close. Having risen from the eggs, stretching out her neck and beak, she freezes in such a pose, typical for some herons, and flies off only when the observer shakes the branches of the nesting tree. Frightened from the nest, it returns relatively soon to the incubated eggs, but for a long time does not fly up to the nest, the laying of which has not yet been completed. The timing of incubation of eggs in green night herons has not been clarified. Apparently, like most herons, the chicks acquire the ability to climb and fly in a short time. On the river A juvenile specimen was caught by Przhevalsky on July 12, and from the middle of July young specimens came across to him quite often (Shulpin, 1936).