Pied heron

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Many thanks to the responses.  I'm not sure who was from where now :-)

 

I was having an argument with someone that was trying very hard to convince me the bird was a juvenile White necked heron (Ardea pacifica).  His argument was the white on the shoulder, which I tried to explain was not the same as the white patch on the underwing of pacifica, but I was not getting anywhere.    I tried also to explain that pacifica does NOT have yellow legs but he says the following:

 

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I hate to do this to you, but I'm sure you've misidentified the species. This is an adult (or almost-adult) White-necked Heron (_Ardea pacifica_). The clues are the white belly/legs and the white wing area (at the carpal joint and visible here as a white line at the front of the folded wing).

Not sure I can find one quickly (no examples in my own files unfortunately) but I can point you to the illustration on page 73 of Michael Morcombe's Field Guide to Australian Birds.

 

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Well, I hope your responses have solved this ridiculous problem  :-)

 

Thanks again.

 

Cheers

Mark Newton      avid photographer :-)