On 14 July Rodney Ungwiluk, Jr. photographed an adult, ABA Code-5, Chinese Pond-Heron (Ardeola bacchus) at Troutman Lake, a few miles south of Gambell, St. Lawrence Island, Alaska.
Paul Lehman reports this represents only the third Alaska and North American record of Chinese Pond-Heron and the first heron species from St. Lawrence Island. This distinctive species breeds from Manchuria and eastern China, west to Assam, northern Burma, and recently into Japan. They primarily winter in the Malay Peninsula, Indochina, Borneo, and Sumatra. Indian birds are sedentary, but the northern populations are migratory. Chinese Pond-Heron is one of the most common heron species in eastern China in spite of being taken, along with their eggs, for food (Handbook of the Birds of the World, Volume 1).
A photograph of this unique heron can be seen here:
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