Magnifient Birds of the Barrier Beaches
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GREAT EGRET
One of our seasonal residents is the Great Egret, Casmerodius Albus.
Formerly know as the American egret, common egret, large egret or the great white heron,
its official name in North America is now the Great Egret.
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It is the largest all-white bird in its family, Ardeinae.
It runs from 35 to 41 inches in length, has a 55 inch wing span, and weighs about 2 pounds.
It has a long straight yellow bill and very long black legs.
It is often confused with the white phase of the great blue heron, seen in Florida, which is somewhat larger and has greenish-yellow legs. The snowy egret, in our area, is also all-white but it is smaller than the great and has a black bill.
The great egret and its relatives are from the order Ciconiiformes, which includes the wading birds that are associated with shallow water.
Egrets do not swim and do not have webbed feet.
They stalk through the shallow water of wetlands, streams, ponds and lakes in search of food.
Great egrets are very good hunters, staying quite still until, with lightening-fast speed, they stab their prey with their spear-shaped bill. Their diet consists of the fish, frogs, crayfish, voles, aquatic insects, and other insects.
While my source material doesn't include birds, I have personally observed great egrets taking birds that were nesting in low reeds and sedges in the salt marsh. Also from my observation, after some excellent stealth hunting the egret then faces the problem of getting the prey into its narrow bill and down its long slender neck. I've often seen a great egret stab a fish or vole in its midsection, resulting in the prey being crosswise to the bird's bill. At that point the hunter flips the would-be meal up in the air to realign it so that it may fit into its bill and down its throat. This activity usually takes many attempts and sometimes attracts an audience of the smaller snowy egrets or little blue herons hoping to steal the kill. When a bird is the catch, the egret has to deal with the bird's flapping wings until succumbs from being crushed.
Generally great egrets are solitary hunters but they nest in colonies often near herons and other wading birds.
The colonies are not permanent and after many years may be abandoned.
When it reaches sexual maturity, usually at 2 years,
the male great egret announces his intentions to mate when he arrives in the heronry by picking a good nesting spot or taking over an old nest.
He begins to display his 30 to 50 extended back plumes, present only in mating season,
until one of the females in the area accepts his invitation and hops onto the branch next to him.
Sometimes he may drive her away after her first approach and continue to display.
Eventually he allows her to remain on the nest and their mating ritual continues with plume displaying and raised wings.
Egrets make their nests with twigs and sticks, either collected from the ground or stolen from unoccupied nests.
The male does most of the twig gathering, while the female manages the placement.
Twig presentation continues even after the eggs have been laid, incubated and hatched.
The nest is never left unattended because the stick material will be taken by other birds in the colony quickly, leaving nothing for the pair when it comes home.
The nest is usually in a tree 20, or more, feet above ground and stretching out about 3 feet.
The height of the nest is good protection from predators but sometimes it's difficult for the long legged top heavy birds.
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Female great egrets lay their eggs sometime around the end of April, one egg at a time over several days.
There may be as many as 5 pale greenish-blue eggs.
Incubation starts after the first egg is laid and the parents share the duty.
The first egg hatches in about 4 weeks and the chicks grow rapidly, making the first chick considerably larger and stronger than the last chick when it hatches.
Since competition for food among the brood is intense, it's not unusual for the youngest chicks to starve.
Both egret parents attend the young and they feed them predigested, regurgitated food by dropping it into the nest.
Feeding is a frenzied activity.
As soon as the food lands in the nest the hatchlings fight for their meal gulping down the biggest chucks first.
If there is ample food and the larger chicks become sated, the smaller chicks can find enough food to survive.
By 4 weeks the chicks are left unattended on the nest so that both parents may forage for enough food for themselves and their offspring.
When the chicks are first hatched they are covered with fine white down and pink bills and are mostly helpless.
Within 3 weeks they are hopping off the nest and walking on other branches but they return to the nest for feeding.
After another week they may accept their food off the nest and they are hopping and flapping their wings.
By 7 weeks, the wing flapping becomes more intense and the chick gains "air time" and discovers it can fly short distances around the nest. Eventually the youngster dares to fly over open space to the next tree. By then it is well developed and almost as large as its parents, but very awkward, and its first landing requires a lot of wing flapping to maintain balance.
The youngsters stay with their parents until autumn when they start off for their winter quarters.
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The wings of the great egret are proportionally wider and longer than other white egrets and herons.
They are recognized in flight because they hold their necks in a more open S-curve than their look-alikes.
Both of the sexes look the same but the male is slightly larger.
In breeding plumage they both sport aigrettes, long plumes, which extend from their backs beyond their tails.
It is these lovely plumes that almost caused the extinction of the great egrets in the early 20th century.
The feather plumes were in demand for millinery and the birds were overhunted.
Market hunting was outlawed but unchecked wetland degradation and over development kept the great egret population from returning to its previous levels and legal protection was established.
The great egret is found on both coasts of North America as well as along the Great Lakes and Mississippi Valley.
Along the Atlantic Coast, great egrets breed in New England and Coastal New York. Non-breeding adult great egrets may wander further north than their breeding relatives in the summer.
Winters are spent south of New Jersey.
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