All birds Herons, Egrets, and Bitterns
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Snowy Egret
Egretta thula
Here April to October.
Recorded by Paul Marvin. CC BY-NC-SA 3.0, via xeno-canto, trimmed and volume evened out.
Look for
- A small egret that's white all over, with a long neck.
- A black bill, with a bit of yellow in front of each eye.
- Black legs with bright yellow feet. People say it looks like it's wearing golden slippers. Young ones may have greenish legs.
A little about it
Snowy Egrets spend the summer here. Look for them from April to October, with the most in September. In winter they leave, and some fly as far south as Panama.
This egret is a busy hunter. It walks or even runs through shallow water after its food. It eats fish, frogs, crayfish, snails, worms, and bugs, and it may even catch a snake or a lizard.
Snowy Egrets nest in big groups, often with other water birds. Both parents build a nest of sticks in a tree or bush, usually 5 to 10 feet up. The mother lays 3 to 5 pale blue-green eggs.
In the 1800s, people hunted Snowy Egrets for their fancy feathers, and very few were left. Laws protected them. Now there are more Snowy Egrets than ever.
Fun fact
A Snowy Egret may shuffle its feet in the mud at the bottom of a pond. That scares hiding animals out into the open, so the egret can grab them.
When it's here
- January: a few
- February: not here
- March: a few
- April: here
- May: here
- June: here
- July: here
- August: here
- September: here
- October: here
- November: not here
- December: not here
Taller bars mean more sightings. Most often seen in September.
How big
22 to 26 inches, with wings a little over 3 feet across. Bigger than a crow, but much smaller than a Great Egret.
Where to look
Marshes and the shallow edges of ponds and lakes. Sometimes it hunts for bugs in dry fields, near cattle.
People have spotted it at Lake Overholser, Martin Park Nature Center, Arcadia Lake.
Could it be something else?
Great Egret
Also white all over, but much bigger. Its bill is yellow and its legs are black. A Snowy Egret has a black bill and yellow feet.
Cattle Egret
A smaller, chunkier white bird with a short yellow bill. It usually hunts for bugs in dry fields, next to cows or horses.
Where these facts come from
- Audubon Guide to North American Birds
- When it's here: Sightings shared on iNaturalist in the 8 counties, all years.