The Story
This is a Great Egret (Ardea alba) that I photographed at the Charca de Guarinocito near La Dorada, Caldas, Colombia on June 25, 2017. It lives across most of the tropical and warmer temperate regions of the world and nests in trees, in colonies close to water. Around the end of the 19th century great egrets were killed in large numbers for the plumes used on hats, and conservation measures have since let their numbers recover. The great egret can stand up to about a meter tall, with a wingspan of up to 170 centimeters.
I photographed it with a Canon EOS 70D and the EF400mm f/5.6L USM, at 1/1000 sec, f/6.3, ISO 1000. IUCN lists the Great Egret as Least Concern with a stable population, and people living around the lagoon see the birds as an attraction for visitors and do not allow them to be hunted.
©2018 Adam Rainoff Photographer
The bird
The Great Egret (Ardea alba) belongs to the family Ardeidae (Herons, Egrets, and Bitterns) in the eBird/Clements taxonomy.
Source: eBird.org (opens in a new tab)
Conservation
Least Concern on the IUCN Red List (assessment published 2025), with the population trend listed as stable. Source: IUCN Red List