Butorides striata
Silhouette: Andy Wilson · PhyloPic
In 3 days <5% in a week ~10%
The striated heron (Butorides striata) also known as mangrove heron or little green heron, is a small heron, about 44 cm tall. It is mostly sedentary and noted for some interesting behavioural traits. The breeding habitat is in South America and the Caribbean. The striated heron was formerly considered to be conspecific with the little heron that is found in the Old World tropics from west Africa to Japan and Australia.
The striated heron was formally described by the Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus in 1758 in the tenth edition of his Systema Naturae. He placed it with the other herons in the genus Ardea and coined the binomial name Ardea striata. Linnaeus specified the locality as Suriname. The specific epithet is from Latin striatus meaning "striated". The striated heron is now one of four closely related species placed in the genus Butorides that was described in 1852 by the English zoologist Edward Blyth.
This bird was long considered to be conspecific with the closely related North American species, the green heron, which is now usually separated as Butorides virescens, as well as the lava heron of the Galápagos Islands (now Butorides sundevalli, but often included... Wikipedia →
| # | City | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Salvador | 🇧🇷 Brazil | |
| 2 | Antananarivo | 🇲🇬 Madagascar | |
| 3 | Fortaleza | 🇧🇷 Brazil | |
| 4 | Denpasar | 🇮🇩 Indonesia | |
| 5 | Recife | 🇧🇷 Brazil | |
| 6 | Ouagadougou | 🇧🇫 Burkina Faso | |
| 7 | Jinhua | 🇨🇳 China | |
| 8 | Jakarta | 🇮🇩 Indonesia | |
| 9 | Makassar | 🇮🇩 Indonesia | |
| 10 | Zanzibar City | 🇹🇿 Tanzania |
| # | Zoo / Centre | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Barcelona Zoo | 🇪🇸 Spain | |
| 2 | Parque Zoobotânico Arruda Câmara (BICA) | 🇧🇷 Brazil | |
| 3 | Aquarama Barcelona | 🇪🇸 Spain | |
| 4 | L'Oceanogràfic | 🇪🇸 Spain | |
| 5 | Mangal das Garças | 🇧🇷 Brazil | |
| 6 | Cali Zoo | 🇨🇴 Colombia |
Rare
Under 5% of wildlife watchers report a Striated Heron sighting in Durban on a given day, based on 16 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data. It is the 155th most-seen of the 219 birds we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to under 5%, and over a week to about 10%, if each day is a fresh chance.
July
In that month about 10% of wildlife watchers report a Striated Heron in Durban on a given day, against under 5% in August to June, the lowest months. That is one of Durban's driest months, with about 40 mm of rain against 210 mm in January.
Between 7 and 10 am
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Striated Heron sightings with a recorded time, and about 9 in 10 of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is a daytime animal.
112th of 146
Of the 146 cities where we can rate Striated Heron sightings, Durban ranks 112th at under 5%. The best odds are in Salvador (Brazil, about 60%), Antananarivo (Madagascar, about 50%) and Fortaleza (Brazil, about 50%).
Same family: Ardeidae
The closest relatives of the Striated Heron that you can see in Durban (family Ardeidae, Herons, Egrets, and Bitterns) are Grey Heron (about 20%), Black-headed Heron (about 20%) and Little Egret (about 10%), with each one's daily chance of a sighting.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Striated Heron is recorded against all the birds logged in Durban (16 verified sightings), calibrated against known sighting rates. Figures are rounded to the nearest 10% because citizen-science data supports honest approximations, not decimals, and months with records from fewer than five people show "—". How it works.
