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Egretta garzetta garzetta Linnaeus, 1766

Egretta garzetta-Psili Ammos-Samos1.jpg <b><i>Egretta garzetta garzetta</b></i> Linnaeus, 1766Thumbnails<b><i>Ceratonia siliqua</b></i> Linnaeus, 1753<b><i>Egretta garzetta garzetta</b></i> Linnaeus, 1766Thumbnails<b><i>Ceratonia siliqua</b></i> Linnaeus, 1753<b><i>Egretta garzetta garzetta</b></i> Linnaeus, 1766Thumbnails<b><i>Ceratonia siliqua</b></i> Linnaeus, 1753<b><i>Egretta garzetta garzetta</b></i> Linnaeus, 1766Thumbnails<b><i>Ceratonia siliqua</b></i> Linnaeus, 1753

Egretta garzetta garzetta Linnaeus, 1766
Common names: Little Egret [Fr], Aigrette garzette [Fr], Kleine Zilverreiger [Nl], Seidenreiher [De], Garzetta comune [It], Garceta Común [Es], Λευκοτσικνιάς [Gr], Küçük ak balıkçıl [Tu]

IUCN Status: LC (Least Concern)

Psili Ammos, SAMOS ● Greece

Description: Small white heron. The adult is 55–65 cm long with an 88–106 cm wingspan, and weighs 350–550 grams. Its plumage is all white. The subspecies garzetta has long black legs with yellow feet and a slim black bill. In the breeding season, the adult has two long nape plumes and gauzy plumes on the back and breast, and the bare skin between the bill and eyes becomes red or blue. Juveniles are similar to non-breeding adults but have greenish-black legs and duller yellow feet. has yellow feet and a bare patch of grey-green skin between the bill and eyes. The subspecies nigripes differs in having yellow skin between the bill and eye, and blackish feet.

Depending on authority, two or three subspecies of Little Egret are currently accepted:
E. g. garzetta – vivid yellow feet and a grey-green patch of skin between the bill and eyes ; Europe, Africa, and most of Asia except the southeast;
E. g. nigripes – black feet and has a yellow patch of skin between the eyes and bill; Indonesia east to New Guinea
E. g. immaculata – Australia and (non-breeding) New Zealand, often considered synonymous with E. g. nigripes.

Biology: Little Egrets eat fish, insects, amphibians, crustaceans, and reptiles. They stalk their prey in shallow water, often running with raised wings or shuffling its feet to disturb small fish. They may also stand still and wait to ambush prey.
Little Egrets are mostly silent but make various croaking and bubbling calls at their breeding colonies and produce a harsh alarm call when disturbed.
The Little Egret nests in colonies, often with other wading birds, usually on platforms of sticks in trees or shrubs or in a reedbed or bamboo grove. In some locations such as the Cape Verde Islands, they nest on cliffs. Pairs defend a small breeding territory, usually extending around 3–4 m from the nest. The three to five eggs are incubated by both adults for 21–25 days to hatching. They are oval in shape and have a pale, non-glossy, blue-green colour. The young birds are covered in white down feathers, are cared for by both parents and fledge after 40 to 45 days.

Habitat: It inhabits fresh, brackish or saline wetlands and shows a preference for shallow waters (10-15 cm deep) in open, unvegetated sites where water levels and dissolved oxygen levels fluctuate daily, tidally or seasonally, and where fish are concentrated in pools or at the water's surface. Habitats frequented include the margins of shallow lakes, rivers, streams and pools, open swamps and marshes, flooded meadows, lagoons, irrigation canals, aquaculture ponds, saltpans and rice fields. The species also occupies dry fields, inland savannas and cattle pastures and some populations are almost entirely coastal, inhabiting rocky or sandy shores, reefs, estuaries, mudflats, saltmarshes, mangroves and tidal creeks.

Distribution: Its breeding distribution is in wetlands in warm temperate to tropical parts of Europe, Africa, Asia, and Australia. In warmer locations, most birds are permanent residents; northern populations, including many European birds, migrate to Africa and southern Asia. They may also wander north in late summer after the breeding season, which may have assisted its current range expansion.
The Little Egret has now started to colonise the New World. Birds are seen with increasing regularity and have occurred from Suriname and Brazil in the south to Newfoundland and Quebec in the north.

References:
BirdLife International
Arkive.org
Wikipedia, Little Egret



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