Snowy Egret~ Egretta thula ~~~~Mason Nistad

Mason Nistad

The Snowy Egret

Egretta thula

The Snowy Egret is a beautiful white bird with a black beak, black legs and black feet. The scientific name of the snowy egret is Egretta thula. The Snowy Egret is mostly found in North, Central, South America, Caribbean. More specifically, shallow bays and marshes. The Snowy Egret belongs to a domain, kingdom, phylum, class, order, family, genus and species. It’s domain is Eukarya, the kingdom is Animalia. the phylum is chordata, its class is Aves, its order is Ciconiiformes, its family is Ardeidae, its genus is Egretta and its species is thula. The Snowy Egret has many adaptations but some of them are very interesting. One of the snowy egrets' adaptations is its wings. The snowy Egrets wings are very tight against  its body to make it easier to hunt for pray. Another adaptation is its fast flying ability. The last adaptation is its upright position. The birds' upright position helps the bird move faster and fly faster to do daily tasks. A fun fact about this fascinating bird is that it looks a lot like the great egret but the great egret happens to have a yellow beak unlike the snowy egrets black beak. The snowy egret eats smaller animals like fish, frogs, worms, and insects. The birds' predators are owls, hawks and racoons. The snowy egret is a heterotrophic organism which means it uses energy from other organisms for its food. The snowy egret has bilateral symmetry; that means that when you were to fold the organism in half vertically it would watch up perfectly. The snowy egret is an endothermic organism which means mammals and birds maintain a constant body temperature, regardless of the temperature of the surroundings.

This picture is from www.veniceaudubon.org