Sun Bittern (Eurypyga helias)

Tropical Realm - Chester Zoo 2015

Wunderfull picture of this beautiful bird, thanks for sharing karoocheetah !

Great photo - now to get one with the wings open!

If this is the one from Twycross, I saw him/her as an egg.

bongorob said:

If this is the one from Twycross, I saw him/her as an egg.

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The one from Twycross was a male,its been awhile since he was an egg!

zoogiraffe said:

The one from Twycross was a male,its been awhile since he was an egg!

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ha ha - no, it's in the Chester Zoo gallery - so it's a Chester Bird!

and yes SMR - I have a series of half hearted wing open shots - I will get it though.....one day!!

karoocheetah said:

ha ha - no, it's in the Chester Zoo gallery - so it's a Chester Bird!

and yes SMR - I have a series of half hearted wing open shots - I will get it though.....one day!!

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Yes but the male at Chester was hatched at Twycross before he arrived at Chester!

zoogiraffe said:

Yes but the male at Chester was hatched at Twycross before he arrived at Chester!

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ah I see

I can't tell the male from the female myself - do you know if the leg rings can be used to do that with captive birds?

In Sunbitterns there is no difference between male and female ( at least not visiable ).
Rings can indeed used to tell the sexes apart. At Walsrode we used to ring the birds afther they had been sexed the following way, males got a ring on the right leg, females on the left leg. Also colored rings can be used, for example blue rings for males, red rings for females.
Don't know however if Twycross and/or Chester use one of these systems..

BTW, here a picture of a Sunbittern with opened wings ( at Antwerp Zoo ) :
http://www.zoochat.com/35/sunbittern-389670/?highlight=sunbittern