Nyctanassa violacea

The yellow-crowned night heron is one of two species of night heron in the genus Nyctanassa. Unlike the black-crowned night heron, which has a worldwide distribution, the yellow-crowned is restricted to the Americas. It is known as the bihoreau violacé in French and the pedrete corona clara or yaboa común in some Spanish-speaking countries.

Nyctanassa violacea

Chuck Homler (FocusOnWildlife.Me) · CC BY-SA 4.0 · via Wikipedia/Commons. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.

On record

Recorded, not inferred
Also called
yellow-crowned night heronPBDB
Sits inside
NyctanassaPBDB
Diet
piscivorePBDB, for Ardeidae
Life habit
volantPBDB, for Ardeidae
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Theropoda
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Ardeidae

Time the record covers

At least 1.3 million years on record.

The record covers at least 1.4 Mya to 11.7 ka. No occurrence read is dated outside 4.7 Mya to 0 Mya.

Pliocene — about 1 of 18 occurrencesPliocenePleistocene — about 8 of 18 occurrencesPleistoceneHolocene — about 9 of 18 occurrences4.9–4.7 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences4.7–4.5 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences4.5–4.3 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences4.3–4.2 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences4.2–4.0 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences4.0–3.8 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences3.8–3.6 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences3.6–3.5 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences3.5–3.3 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences3.3–3.1 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences3.1–2.9 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences2.9–2.8 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences2.8–2.6 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences2.6–2.4 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences2.4–2.3 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences2.3–2.1 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences2.1–1.9 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences1.9–1.7 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences1.7–1.6 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences1.6–1.4 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences867 ka–693 ka Mya — about 0.3 occurrences693 ka–520 ka Mya — about 0.5 occurrences520 ka–347 ka Mya — about 0.5 occurrences347 ka–173 ka Mya — about 0.5 occurrences173 ka–0 Mya — about 15 occurrences1.4 Mya11.7 ka5.2 Mya0 Mya

18 occurrences of Nyctanassa violacea on record. The Paleobiology Database records this as a living group. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.

When

18 occurrences

These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.

Found in

2 formations

Okeechobee — 27.53°N, 80.47°WTamiami — 27.37°N, 82.45°W

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The named rock units Nyctanassa violacea has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 15 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Found in the same rock

540 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 18 sites for Nyctanassa violacea, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.

This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.

Entered from

12 references

Each of the 18 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.

Media and terms

Media content3

Picture of Nyctanassa violacea

Credit
Chuck Homler (FocusOnWildlife.Me)
Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

CT scan

Licence
In Copyright
Commercial use
cannot be read from the licence given — check the record
Specimen
Nyctanassa violacea · TxVP:M:16612

3D model

Source
Sketchfab
Credit
dgred
Licence
CC Attribution
Commercial use
cannot be read from the licence given — check the record

Smithsonian Open Access was not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.

The description on this site

Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0

This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.

Keep going

What may have been alongside itNyctanassa through timeThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. (Linnaeus 1758)