Censusing Reddish Egrets

As the sun rises over Florida’s coastline, thousands of birds descend on its shallow waters and mudflats, where they forage for fish and other prey. On a typical day, Audubon coastal staff spot Ospreys, White Ibises, Roseate Spoonbills, and more. This year, however, teams in both Florida Bay and along the Gulf Coast have kept a special eye out for a unique wading bird: the Reddish Egret. 

Why Reddish Egrets?

Considered North America’s rarest heron, the most recent IUCN Red List Assessment (2020) estimates that Reddish Egrets have a global population of just 5,000-9,999 mature individuals. The last statewide census in 2016 showed roughly 500 nesting pairs in Florida. 

The Reddish Egret lives year-round in coastal Florida, Cuba, the Bahamas, and coastal Texas and Mexico. Despite their widespread range, Reddish Egrets remain rare sights due to their low numbers and patchy population distribution. These habitat specialists are restricted to coastal, undisturbed, saline landscapes that include lagoons, beaches, marshes, islands, or tidal flats. To forage successfully, they seek out water levels ranging from 5 cm to 20 cm deep. Their foraging strategy—capturing fish while leaping with their wings held above their head—is most effective in shallow waters. 

Many of Florida’s Reddish Egrets reside in Florida Bay, a lagoon that makes up one third of Everglades National Park and is located at the very southern tip of the Florida mainland, situated between the Everglades and the Florida Keys. The bay is comprised of mudflats exposed at low tide, intermixed with pockets of deeper water and seagrass beds. Florida Bay receives fresh water that flows down through the Everglades, mixing with tidal salt water from the Gulf and the Atlantic, creating a lagoon that supports biodiversity hotspots. Combined with untouched, protective mangrove islands, the bay is an ideal place for a Reddish Egret to call home and an excellent location for the Audubon's Everglades Research Station team to focus their research efforts. 

Beyond Florida Bay: Tampa

Reddish Egrets also raise their families in the urban estuaries of Tampa Bay and along the Southwest Florida coast. Extirpated from the region in the early 1900s due to hunting for the plume trade, Reddish Egrets recolonized Tampa Bay in the mid 1970s. Many of the islands that they rely on in the region are dredge spoil islands. Healthy coastal environments with good water quality and enough small fish to support Reddish Egrets are essential to their survival.

Monitoring 

Unsurprisingly, research on this species is limited and ongoing. The biologists at the Audubon Everglades Research Station in the Florida Keys and Florida Coastal Islands Sanctuaries in the Tampa Bay region are determined to better understand these mysterious birds. The teams have spent much of 2025 and 2026 climbing through remote mangrove islands in search of Reddish Egret nests across dozens of sites. 

Conservation Concern

A 2022 assessment identified climate change, coastal engineering, human disturbance, and development as the top threats facing Reddish Egrets worldwide. Across most of its range, sea level rise would eliminate valuable foraging habitat due to erosion and inundation. Furthermore, increased frequency and intensity of storms would physically damage nesting habitat, taking years to recover. In some cases, habitat is lost forever. Increased coastal development results in direct loss or alteration of nesting and foraging habitat. Activities such as dredging, shoreline armoring, shipping, and construction change the hydrology of the landscape, release contaminants, and decrease water quality of the wetlands Reddish Egrets inhabit. In addition to climate change impacts, coastal development and engineering irreversibly damage Reddish Egret habitat. Audubon surveys in Tampa Bay suggest recent declines there, making this statewide census that much more important. Our research attempts to tease out whether the decline is due to a decline in breeding success or birds moving to other parts of the state. 

What is Audubon Doing to Help Reddish Egrets?

The Reddish Egret, with its low population numbers and stealthy behavior, continues to keep researchers on their toes. Researchers believe that more satellite tracking studies are essential to understand their population dynamics and guide best conservation practices. This year's special effort in collaboration with FWC is part of a statewide census to evaluate their population status. Audubon Florida is protecting their nesting habitat from erosion and human disturbance and working with partners to protect and enhance foraging habitat as well. We are reducing threats from entanglement by cleaning more than 15,000 feet of fishing line from rookery islands each year. Our team conducts annual nest counts and collect data on productivity (nesting success).

This article was published in the 2026 Summer Naturalist.