Tricolored Heron / Witbuikreiger, Wetbere sabaku

Tricolored Heron (Egretta tricolor)

Pictures (click on them to enlarge)
© Leo Olmtak	© Erik Toorman	© Wouter Plouvier
© Frank Valk	© Eke van Batenburg	© Dominiek Plouvier
young in July © Hans Majong	Kabalebo © Armida Madngisa nature guide	French Guiana © Pascal Dubois
Florida © Jean-Louis Rousselle

Tricolored Heron: This heron makes its nests together with other herons in the mangrove. Sometimes more than 10,000 nestling pairs have been counted on one day.Tricolored herons are numerous along the mud coast of Suriname, but now and then one is found farther away from the coast as can be seen on the map below.
Photo of a tricolored heron, made by Leo Olmtak in his neighbourhood in Paramaribo and then a picture by Erik Toorman in Suriname (June 2003), one by Wouter Plouvier in Suriname (Dec 2005) and one by Pascal Dubois in French Guyane (Côté Nature).
Dominiek Plouvier made the video.

Video (click the link or the 'play'-button to see)
Video recording of a Tricolored Heron © ;

Distribution

Each small square indicates the observation of at least one (group) of these birds, the medium ones at least four observations on different days and the largest ones ten or more. The color of each square indicates: blue for coastal area, yellow for savanna and red for rainforest.
Not all places in Suriname have been equally often visited by birders, so the distribution of the squares gives an indication of the whereabouts of the birds, but also of the birders. Some places deep in the south have no reported bird observations, by experienced birders, within 60 kilometer.

Abundance in different areas
coastal zone (blue dots on the map) :
northern savannas (yellow dots (in the north)) :
rainforest under 400 m (red dots) :
rainforest above 400 m (red dots) :
Sipaliwini savanna (yellow dots (in the south)) :
A blank is shown if not convincingly reported in the zone. Data interpreted by Arie Spaans, Otte Ottema and Jan Hein Ribot.

Names
Scientific name:	Egretta tricolor
Order:	Ciconiiformes
Family:	Ardeidae, 20 in Suriname
Dutch:	Witbuikreiger, Wetbere sabaku
English:	Tricolored Heron
Sranan ('Surinamese'):	Wetbere Sabaku
Guyana:
Papiamento:	Gran gudjee, Garabet
Spanish (Venezuela):	Garza pechiblanca
Portugese (Brazil):
Arowak:
Carib:
French:	Aigrette tricolor, Aigrette à ventre blanc

Observations through the year	Observations of breeding through the year

The 457 reported observations of this bird in Suriname, mainly for the last 50 years up to 2018, have been grouped by month. More birds on one day are counted as one observation. Of course, if the graph should depict the total number of birds seen, the differences between the months could be much more pronounced.	The 13 reported breeding observations of this bird in Suriname. Most observations are about nest with eggs, some about fledglings, or feeding at a nest or the building of a nest. Of the about 5000 nests and eggs found for all species together, about 1/3 comes from the egg collection of Penard between 1896 and 1905. For some reason most collecting then was done in the first half of each year, so the shown distribution does not necessarily reflect the actual breeding preferences. The main dry season in Suriname is reckoned to be from half August to the end of November, the main wet season from half April to half August, but the the timing of begin and end does vary from year to year. Around March a second dry season often occurs.

Observations through the year

Observations of breeding through the year

The 457 reported observations of this bird in Suriname, mainly for the last 50 years up to 2018, have been grouped by month. More birds on one day are counted as one observation. Of course, if the graph should depict the total number of birds seen, the differences between the months could be much more pronounced.

The 13 reported breeding observations of this bird in Suriname. Most observations are about nest with eggs, some about fledglings, or feeding at a nest or the building of a nest.

Of the about 5000 nests and eggs found for all species together, about 1/3 comes from the egg collection of Penard between 1896 and 1905. For some reason most collecting then was done in the first half of each year, so the shown distribution does not necessarily reflect the actual breeding preferences.
The main dry season in Suriname is reckoned to be from half August to the end of November, the main wet season from half April to half August, but the the timing of begin and end does vary from year to year. Around March a second dry season often occurs.

Last update: September 2024 by Jan Hein Ribot. Please mail your comments, photos to: jhribot ( residing at ) gmail (point!) com.
observations can be uploaded to suriname.observation.org or ebird.org ).