🦩Great Blue Heron
The great blue heron is a large wading bird in the heron family (Ardeidae), common near shores of open water and wetlands over most of North and Central America, as well as Northwestern South America, the Caribbean, and the Galápagos Islands. It is occasionally found in the Azores and is a rare vagrant to Europe. An all-white population found in South Florida and the Florida Keys is known as the great white heron. Debate exists about whether these white birds are a color morph of the great blue heron, a subspecies of it, or an entirely separate species.
Text: Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0.
IUCN Red List assessment, 2020.
- Body mass
- 2.52 kg
- Body length
- 1.3 m
- Shoulder height
- not recorded
- Top speed
- not recorded
- Bite force
- not recorded
- Maximum lifespan
- 25 years
Everything we know about the Great Blue Heron
Typical adult figures. Where a value is an estimate rather than a measurement, it says so.
Body mass2.52 kgAVONETOther figures ↓Hide ↑
Source: AVONET · v1.1 (Tobias et al. 2022) · CC BY 4.0
By sex
- Female2.11 kgWikidataQ333796
- Male2.48 kgWikidataQ333796
Figures vary
- 1.87 kgAnAgeAnAge build 15, 2023-07-03 (HAGR)data quality: acceptable
Body length1.3 mmaximum recorded, total lengthSeaLifeBaseDetails ↓Hide ↑
Source: SeaLifeBase · v25.04 · CC BY-NC 4.0
Standing height1.22 mnot statedDetails ↓Hide ↑
NPS: "It stands four feet tall, weighs slightly over four pounds, and has a wingspan of nearly seven feet." (4 ft = 1.22 m). Posture-dependent: ADW instead says "They stand approximately 60 cm tall", an outlier against the c. 1.2 m figure used across .gov pages.
Source: US National Park Service, Great Blue Herons in Cuyahoga Valley, https://www.nps.gov/articles/000/great-blue-herons-in-cuyahoga-valley.htm · see citation
Tail length0.16 mAVONETDetails ↓Hide ↑
Source: AVONET · v1.1 (Tobias et al. 2022) · CC BY 4.0
Wing length0.46 mAVONETDetails ↓Hide ↑
Source: AVONET · v1.1 (Tobias et al. 2022) · CC BY 4.0
Beak length0.15 mAVONETDetails ↓Hide ↑
Source: AVONET · v1.1 (Tobias et al. 2022) · CC BY 4.0
Tarsus length0.17 mAVONETDetails ↓Hide ↑
Source: AVONET · v1.1 (Tobias et al. 2022) · CC BY 4.0
Maximum lifespan25 yearsAnAgeDetails ↓Hide ↑
data quality: acceptable
Source: AnAge · AnAge build 15, 2023-07-03 (HAGR) · CC BY 3.0
Gestation28 daysAnAgeDetails ↓Hide ↑
data quality: acceptable
Source: AnAge · AnAge build 15, 2023-07-03 (HAGR) · CC BY 3.0
Litter sizeabout 4AnAgeDetails ↓Hide ↑
data quality: acceptable
Source: AnAge · AnAge build 15, 2023-07-03 (HAGR) · CC BY 3.0
Trophic levelCarnivoreAVONETDetails ↓Hide ↑
Source: AVONET · v1.1 (Tobias et al. 2022) · CC BY 4.0
HabitatWetlandAVONETDetails ↓Hide ↑
Source: AVONET · v1.1 (Tobias et al. 2022) · CC BY 4.0
LifestyleTerrestrialAVONETDetails ↓Hide ↑
Source: AVONET · v1.1 (Tobias et al. 2022) · CC BY 4.0
Danger to humansharmlessSeaLifeBaseDetails ↓Hide ↑
Source: SeaLifeBase · v25.04 · CC BY-NC 4.0
Volume l2.5 LaverageDetails ↓Hide ↑
Body mass at ~1.0 kg/L, the density of vertebrate tissue.
average = a mean across sexes or species in a group.
Not recorded for Great Blue Heron yet: shoulder height, top speed, bite force.
Family tree
- kingdomAnimalia
- ›phylumChordata
- ›classAves
- ›orderPelecaniformes
- ›familyArdeidae
- ›genusArdea
- ›speciesArdea herodias
- superclassTetrapoda
- orderSauria
- classBirds · Aves
- familyArdeidae
All 10 branches ↓Fewer branches ↑
- kingdomMetazoa
- phylumChordata
- subphylumCraniata
- subphylumVertebrata
- superclassGnathostomata
- superclassSarcopterygii
- superclassTetrapoda
- orderSauria
- classBirds · Aves
- familyArdeidae
More about the Great Blue Heron
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