{"id":255141,"date":"2026-06-04T12:49:09","date_gmt":"2026-06-04T12:49:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/255141\/"},"modified":"2026-06-04T12:49:09","modified_gmt":"2026-06-04T12:49:09","slug":"fly-by-night-why-this-popular-nyc-bird-is-going-extinct-and-what-can-be-done-to-save-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/255141\/","title":{"rendered":"Fly by night: Why this popular NYC bird is going extinct\u2014and what can be done to save it"},"content":{"rendered":"

The night heron \u2014 a NYC bird species known for his stocky body, stilt-like legs, and a love for perching in Central Park \u2014 is on the path to extinction, according to an alarming new study published in Conservation Science and Practice<\/a> on Wednesday.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The black-crowned night heron (Nycticorax nycticorax), native to the tiny islands of New York Harbor and the shores of the boroughs, makes people smile when they spot the popular bird in parks, lakes, and even at times on NYC streets and alleyways.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Conservationists from the NYC Bird Alliance<\/a>, who published the study, said the black-crowned night heron, the most common nesting wading bird in the harbor, has declined by a staggering 55% since 2000. If the trend continues, researchers warn the species could vanish from local waters by 2037.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"heronA black-crowned night heron in Central Park.<\/p>\n

The black-crowned night heron is more than just a cute bird and a familiar sight in NYC. Experts consider it a key indicator of environmental health, meaning its struggles could signal larger problems in the harbor ecosystem.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In other words, when something is wrong in the environment, they have a way of letting humans know.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

\u201cThey are really powerful ecosystem indicators because they are particularly susceptible to various pollutants,\u201d Dustin Partridge, PhD, lead author and senior director of conservation and science at NYC Bird Alliance, told amNewYork. \u201cSo when pollutants like heavy metals or PCBs [Polychlorinated Biphenyls] or something else is present in a waterway, their young don\u2019t survive.\u201d<\/p>\n

The study\u2019s findings are based on 40 years of data collected through the alliance\u2019s Harbor Herons program, which has been monitoring nesting islands in NYC since 1985. While studying the data, researchers found a clear and consistent decline.<\/p>\n

Environmental contamination is a very likely cause of the species\u2019 decline, but scientists are not ruling out other factors, including predation and habitat loss.\n<\/p>\n

Partying on the islands doesn\u2019t help this NYC bird<\/p>\n

Zeroing in on human disturbance, Partridge said visits to nesting islands during the breeding season can have devastating consequences for the herons. Because NYC Bird Alliance has tracked the species since its original recovery following the 1972 Clean Water Act, researchers have been able to monitor the effects of disruptions on nesting colonies.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The birds are highly sensitive, and human activity can cause adults to abandon nests.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

\u201cThere have been cases where we went to an island for a survey, and the chicks were dead in the nest, and there\u2019s a smoldering fire and signs of people partying,\u201d Partridge shared.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"aSoaring through the Big Apple skies.Photo by Dustin Partridge<\/p>\n

While black-crowned night herons span beyond the shores of New York and New Jersey, the harbor hosts the largest breeding population of the animal in the Northeast. Because the night herons in NYC serve as a regional stronghold, their local decline could signal trouble for the species across the region.\u00a0<\/p>\n

While the black-crowned night heron is rapidly declining, saving the species<\/a> is far from a lost cause. The NYC Bird Alliance is urging New York to consider listing the bird as an official threatened or endangered species in the state. Researchers are also calling for stronger protections<\/a> on nesting islands and increased investment in restoring wetlands and feeding grounds that feathered friends rely on.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat\u2019s great is that we\u2019ve discovered this while this common bird is still common,\u201d Partridge said. \u201cWe can act on this. We\u2019re taking actions that are needed to make sure that this bird does not disappear.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tod Winston, co-author and urban biodiversity specialist at NYC Bird Alliance, pointed to another famous avian success story\u2014the recovery of the great egret.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

\u201cThe recovery of the Great Egret is proof that people can fight for the birds they love, and win,\u201d Winston said. \u201cBirds connect people to the natural world in a profound and personal way, and the Black-crowned Night Heron \u2013 with its striking red eyes, glossy black crown, and jaunty plume \u2013 is one of those birds that stops people in their tracks.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said he is determined to save the heron and prevent the species from going extinct.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are going to make sure this iconic bird doesn\u2019t become a distant memory like the Passenger Pigeon or Carolina Parakeet,\u201d he said.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

Jonahan Kramer, PhD, president and CEO of the Hudson River Foundation, a nonprofit that funds environmental research, said studies such as the night heron one are important for conservation.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

\u201cStudies like these are essential to helping us understand how human activity and habitat loss are driving environmental and species shifts and to developing actionable solutions to sustain the wildlife, habitats, and waterways that are so integral to our region,\u201d Kramer said.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The night heron \u2014 a NYC bird species known for his stocky body, stilt-like legs, and a love…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":255142,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[99369,4709,99370,9,99371,56,63,29321,65,64,99372,99373],"class_list":["post-255141","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york-city","tag-birds-native-to-new-york","tag-central-park","tag-conservation-science-and-practice","tag-new-york","tag-nigh-heron","tag-ny","tag-nyc","tag-nyc-bird-alliance","tag-nyc-headlines","tag-nyc-news","tag-studies-on-animals-in-nyc","tag-urban-wildlife-in-nyc"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/255141","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=255141"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/255141\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/255142"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=255141"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=255141"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=255141"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}