Anguilla, Antigua and Barbuda, Aruba, Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Bermuda (B), Brazil, Canada, Cayman Islands, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Dominica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, French Guiana, Guadeloupe, Guatemala, Guyana, Haiti, Honduras, Jamaica (B) (NB), Martinique, Mexico, Montserrat, Netherlands Antilles, Nicaragua, Panama, Peru, Puerto Rico, St Kitts and Nevis, St Lucia, St Vincent and The Grenadines, Suriname, Trinidad and Tobago, Turks and Caicos Islands, USA (B), Venezuela, Virgin Islands (British) (NB), Virgin Islands (U.S.) (NB).
Vagrant to Portugal, St Pierre and Miquelon (P).
Population
Estimated population is 290,000 (2010).
Tricolored Heron (Egretta tricolor) [XC452973]
by Manuel Grosselet from South Padre Is, Birding and Nature Center, Cameron County, Texas, United States (call)
Tricolored Heron (Egretta tricolor) [XC519779]
by Paul Driver from Topolobampo, Ahome, Sinaloa, Mexico (call, flight call)
Subspecies
Birds of western Mexico often placed in separate subspecies occidentalis.
The following 2 subspecies are recognised:
ruficollis Gosse, 1847 - Southern and eastern USA to central America, western Indies, Colombia and north-western Venezuela.
tricolor (Müller, 1776) - North-eastern Venezuela and Trinidad to north-eastern Brazil; Ecuador and extreme northern Peru.