History of Night Heron in the Prague Zoo

Photo: Prague Zoo

The night heron has been bred at Prague Zoo continuously since at least 1936. Little is known about the origin of the first individuals, but the first documents on the arrival of young birds from the South-Bohemian population start in 1947 and 1948. Other imports from the wild followed in 1959 (four specimens), and 1965-1967 (more than twenty specimens) and then in 1978.

The first actual breeding (i.e. hatched from eggs laid by birds kept at Zoo) occurred in the early 1960’s and then in the 1990’s there was a real boom in offspring; so much so that night heron breeding began to flourish to such an extent that it was becoming increasingly difficult to ensure their winter hibernation.
Therefore, as at the zoo in Nuremberg, it was decided to keep this species as a semi-wild living population, and this type of breeding has proven very successful.

In the following years, despite the original birds dying, the number of nesting pairs did not fall, quite the opposite it has slowly grown to a basic number of six to eight pairs. It was roughly in 2003 that the original charges were completely replaced by wild birds and the population became totally independent. During the floods in 2013, three young birds escaped from the damaged Danube Delta Aviary and this year they successfully nested at Prague Zoo.

This year the zoo has seen the documented nesting of at least 13 pairs, of which eleven were successful. Most pairs have gone on to nest for a second time.