Aigrette garzette au lac sud de Tunis (site RAMSAR)🦩

Photo: El Golli Mohamed · CC BY-SA 4.0

SpeciesPelecaniformesArdeidae
Birds

🦩Little Egret

Egretta garzetta (Linnaeus, 1766)

The little egret is a species of small heron in the family Ardeidae. It is a white bird with a slender black beak, long black legs and, in the western race, yellow feet. As an aquatic bird, it feeds in shallow water and on land, consuming a variety of small creatures. It breeds colonially, often with other species of water birds, making a platform nest of sticks in a tree, bush or reed bed. A clutch of three to five bluish-green eggs is laid and incubated by both parents for about three weeks. The young fledge at about six weeks of age.

Text: Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0.

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Photos
1
Measurements
11
vs you
≈ 1/200th of your weight
Conservation status
LCLeast concern

IUCN Red List assessment, 2025.

Population trendStable
Key measurements
Body mass
0.31 kg
Body length
not recorded
Shoulder height
not recorded
Top speed
not recorded
Bite force
not recorded
Maximum lifespan
22 years
All measurements ↓
Facts and figures

Everything we know about the Little Egret

Typical adult figures. Where a value is an estimate rather than a measurement, it says so.

Body mass
0.31 kg
AVONET
Other figures ↓

Source: AVONET · v1.1 (Tobias et al. 2022) · CC BY 4.0

Figures vary

  • 0.31 kgAnAgeAnAge build 15, 2023-07-03 (HAGR)data quality: acceptable
Tail length
0.09 m
AVONET
Details ↓

Source: AVONET · v1.1 (Tobias et al. 2022) · CC BY 4.0

Wing length
0.25 m
AVONET
Details ↓

Source: AVONET · v1.1 (Tobias et al. 2022) · CC BY 4.0

Beak length
0.09 m
AVONET
Details ↓

Source: AVONET · v1.1 (Tobias et al. 2022) · CC BY 4.0

Tarsus length
0.1 m
AVONET
Details ↓

Source: AVONET · v1.1 (Tobias et al. 2022) · CC BY 4.0

Maximum lifespan
22 years
AnAge
Details ↓

data quality: acceptable

Source: AnAge · AnAge build 15, 2023-07-03 (HAGR) · CC BY 3.0

Trophic level
Carnivore
AVONET
Details ↓

Source: AVONET · v1.1 (Tobias et al. 2022) · CC BY 4.0

Habitat
Wetland
AVONET
Details ↓

Source: AVONET · v1.1 (Tobias et al. 2022) · CC BY 4.0

Lifestyle
Terrestrial
AVONET
Details ↓

Source: AVONET · v1.1 (Tobias et al. 2022) · CC BY 4.0

Danger to humans
harmless
SeaLifeBase
Details ↓

Source: SeaLifeBase · v25.04 · CC BY-NC 4.0

Volume l
0.3 Laverage
Details ↓

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 Little Egret yet: body length, shoulder height, top speed, bite force.

Where it sits

Family tree

  1. kingdomAnimalia
  2. ›phylumChordata
  3. ›classAves
  4. ›orderPelecaniformes
  5. ›familyArdeidae
  6. ›genusEgretta
  7. ›speciesEgretta garzetta
Full lineage
  1. superclassTetrapoda
  2. orderSauria
  3. classBirds · Aves
  4. familyArdeidae
All 10 branches ↓
  1. kingdomMetazoa
  2. phylumChordata
  3. subphylumCraniata
  4. subphylumVertebrata
  5. superclassGnathostomata
  6. superclassSarcopterygii
  7. superclassTetrapoda
  8. orderSauria
  9. classBirds · Aves
  10. familyArdeidae
More

More about the Little Egret

Closest relative on this site
🦩 Black-crowned Night Heron — last shared an ancestor ≈ 33 million years ago.
In other languages
Czapla nadobna (pl), Egretta garzetta (es), kis kócsag (hu), silkeshäger (sv), سنقيل (ar), kleine zilverreiger (nl) … and 27 more languages
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