The jacanas are a group of wetland birds, which are identifiable by their huge feet and claws, which enable them to walk on floating vegetation in the shallow lakes that are their preferred habitat.

[3] The northern jacana was formally described in 1758 by the Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus in the tenth edition of his Systema Naturae.

[4] Linnaeus based his account on the "spur-winged water hen" that had been described and illustrated in 1743 by the English naturalist George Edwards in his A Natural History of Uncommon Birds.

[5] Edwards mistakenly believed his specimen had been collected near the city of Cartagena in northern Colombia but this was an error as the species is not present there.

[7] The genus name is from the Portuguese word Jaçana for the wattled jacana, which is in turn derived from the Tupi name Yassānā or Yahānā for a noisy waterbird.

Also visible are yellow bony spurs on the leading edge of the wings, which it can use to defend itself and its young.

Young jacana chicks are covered in down and have patterns of orange, browns, black and some white on them.

[9] The northern jacana ranges from Mexico to Panama, although it occasionally visits the southern United States, with vagrants being seen in places such as Arizona.

[9] The northern jacana feeds on insects on the surface of vegetation and ovules of water lilies.

[10] The female maintains bonds with her mates though copulations and producing clutches for them, as well as by protecting their territories and defending the eggs from predators.

[12] Monogamous pairs are sometimes observed,[13] but typically the jacana has a simultaneous polyandrous mating system.

[16] A female may reluctantly incubate the eggs if a male does not have sufficient time to forage throughout the day due to rain and cool temperatures.

[17] Females respond to every call the male makes and invest much interest in the safety of the chicks, despite having little interaction with them.

[10] Predators of the jacana include snakes, caimans, snapping turtles and various large birds and mammals.