Black-crowned Night Heron

Hosts on Spekboom have recorded the Black-crowned Night Heron at stays in or beside Kruger National Park, Kwandwe Private Game Reserve, Phinda Private Game Reserve, Rocherpan Nature Reserve, De Hoop Nature Reserve and Gondwana Game Reserve and other reserves. A record means a host has seen it on the property or nearby, which makes these the places to base yourself; it is never a guarantee of a sighting on any given day.

The Black-crowned Night Heron is most recorded in Western Cape (58% of records), KwaZulu-Natal (11% of records), Mpumalanga (9% of records), based on 1,012 iNaturalist observations. 44 places to stay on Spekboom in South Africa have recorded the Black-crowned Night Heron on site or nearby.

The Black-crowned Night Heron is recorded throughout the year, so no month is the wrong month to look for it. For the parks where hosts record it most, these are the best seasons they give. Kruger National Park: Apr-Sep; Kwandwe Private Game Reserve: year-round, best Mar-May, Sep-Nov; Phinda Private Game Reserve: year-round, dry season May-Sep; Rocherpan Nature Reserve: Winter and spring for birds and flowers, Jun-Oct. In the dry months animals concentrate at water and the grass is short.

The black-crowned night heron (Nycticorax nycticorax), commonly shortened to just night heron in Eurasia, is a medium-sized heron found throughout a large part of the world, except in the coldest regions and Australasia (where it is replaced by the closely related rufous night heron, with which it has hybridized in the area of contact).