Salt Grass Flats - Tricolored Heron

Salt Grass Flats - Celebrating Gulf Coast Birds
Tips & Trips
Field Guides
Scenic Trips

Birds
    American Bittern
    American Coot
    Belted Kingfisher
    Black-necked Stilt
    Black Vulture
    Caracara
    Common Moorhen
    Cormorants
          Double-crested
          Neotropical (Olivaceous)
    Eastern Meadowlark
    Eastern Phoebe
    Great Egret
    Great Horned Owl
    Killdeer
    Little Blue Heron
    Loggerhead Shrike
    Pelicans
      Cooperative Fishing
    Roseate Spoonbill
    Tricolor Heron
    Turkey Vulture
    Snowy Egret
    White-fronted Goose
    Yellow-crowned Night Heron

Wildlife
    Reptiles
      Alligators
      Green Anole
      Red-Eared Slider
      Snakes
    Mammals
      Armadillo
      Bobcat
      River Otter
    Wildlife Rehab

Field Notes
      Where have you been?
      What wildlife have you seen?
      What behavior did you observe?
      Share your experiences here!
      Ask questions of experts.
      Receive identification help.
      Post your questions, photos and
        observations here!

Email Us
Join the update list

Click here!

The Sibley Guide to Birds contains marvelous illustrations originally drawn by the author using watercolors. This is a great identification guide, not only for adult birds, but juveniles, also.

Click here!

The National Audubon Society Field Guide to North American Birds Eastern Region shows birds in beautiful color photographs and includes in-depth information on each bird.

Click here!

Birds of North America (Kaufman Focus Guides) features digitally enhanced photographic images to show the characteristics that are sometimes not apparent in photographs.

Tricolored Heron

Egretta tricolor

Wingspan: 36"
Length: 26"
Weight: 13 ounces

Male/Female similar

Tricolored Heron
(formerly called)
Louisiana Heron.

*Note the bright blue bill
and face skin indicative
of breeding season.

Tricolored Heron in Breeding Plumage
Smith Oaks Sanctuary - High Island, TX

Tricolored Heron - Brazoria NWR

Physical Description:

Very slender heron with graceful movements. Gray-blue upperparts and rufous neck contrast with white belly and white stripe up foreneck. Base of bill and bare face skin are yellowish in most seasons.

Habitat:

Swamps, bayous, coastal ponds, salt marshes, mangrove islands, mud flats, and lagoons.

Tricolored Heron - Feeding - Anahuac NWR

Feeding Habits:

Often stands or wades belly-deep in water; when stalking small fishes in shallows, crouches with legs bent almost double. Also runs rapidly through shallows, wings partly raised, sometimes stretches one foot far forward and vibrates foot rapidly along bottom to flush prey.

Tricolored Heron - Anahuac NWR

Nest:

May be built in small or large colonies by themselves or with other herons, on ground or to 20 feet up in a tree, but usually 6 - 15 feet up. Nest of sticks and twigs.

Tricolored Heron on Nest - Rookery at Smith Oaks Sanctuary, High Island, TX

Eggs:

3 - 4 pale green-blue. Incubation ~21 days

Tricolored Heron with eggs - Smith Oaks Sanctuary, High Island, TX