Nycticorax nycticorax
Silhouette: Andy Wilson · PhyloPic
In 3 days ~30% in a week ~60%
The black-crowned night heron (Nycticorax nycticorax) or black-capped night heron, commonly shortened to just night heron in Eurasia, is a medium-sized heron found throughout a large part of the world, including parts of Africa, Asia, Europe, and North and South America. In Australasia it is replaced by the closely related Nankeen night heron (N. caledonicus), with which it has hybridised in the area of contact.
The black-crowned night heron was formally described by the Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus in 1758 in the tenth edition of his Systema Naturae. He placed it with herons, cranes and egrets in the genus Ardea and coined the binomial name Ardea nycticorax, based on specimens from southern Europe. It is now placed in the genus Nycticorax that was described in 1817 by the English naturalist Thomas Forster for this species. The epithet nycticorax is from Ancient Greek and combines nux, nuktos meaning "night" and korax meaning "raven". The word was used by authors such as Aristotle and Hesychius of Miletus for a "bird of ill omen", perhaps an owl. The word was used by the Swiss naturalist Conrad Gessner in 1555 and then by subsequent authors for a black-crowned... Wikipedia →
With luck
About 10% of wildlife watchers report a Black-crowned Night Heron sighting in Vadodara on a given day, based on 138 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data. It is the 52nd most-seen of the 168 birds we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to about 30%, and over a week to about 60%, if each day is a fresh chance.
August and October
In those months about 20% of wildlife watchers report a Black-crowned Night Heron in Vadodara on a given day, against under 5% in January to March, the lowest months. Those are among Vadodara's wettest months, with about 160 mm of rain a month against almost none in January.
Between 4 and 7 pm
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Black-crowned Night Heron sightings with a recorded time, and about 8 in 10 of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is a daytime animal.
121st of 249
Of the 249 cities where we can rate Black-crowned Night Heron sightings, Vadodara ranks 121st at about 10%. The best odds are in Antananarivo (Madagascar, about 80%), Ningbo (China, about 70%) and Riyadh (Saudi Arabia, about 60%).
Same family: Ardeidae
The closest relatives of the Black-crowned Night Heron that you can see in Vadodara (family Ardeidae, Herons, Egrets, and Bitterns) are Indian Pond Heron (about 40%), intermediate egret (about 20%) and Little Egret (about 20%), with each one's daily chance of a sighting.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Black-crowned Night Heron is recorded against all the birds logged in Vadodara (138 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.
