Rookery, Heronry or Colony??

Back a few years ago, the Snowy Egrets would gather in large masses across the Bayou. Here they would mate, build nests and brood their young. Sometimes the trees were filled with these beautiful birds..all wearing the breeding plumage. This was always such an amazing sight. I would try to take as many pictures as I could but this was back before I had my zoom lens for the camera. I could not do the view justice. Still, it was a thrill just seeing them congregating in the treetops.

Then progress..houses were built across the Bayou at the very site that the birds nested each year. I worried that they would move far away and I would never see them en masse again. This saddened me. After the construction began, I did not see my feathered friends other than along the shoreline or on my pier occasionally. I wondered where they moved. Finally this year, I noticed a few gathering in the back of the Bayou where it turns into the creek. I watched. Sure enough what started out as two or three soon turned into seven or eight and more. They nested there this Spring and reared a number of little ones. I was in hopes that this would become their new rookery.

Today..I noticed something a bit unusual for this time of year. The Snowy Egrets were gathering in the creek again. Surely, they are not nesting now! This evening, I watched as bird after bird flew into the trees growing near the creekbed. More and more birds followed suit and soon the trees were ornamented with the white-plumed birds. I pondered this and have about come to the conclusion that it has something to do with the recent storm. Perhaps they needed to regroup after being blown about a bit. Who knows??? It doesn't really matter to me why they are congregating..I am just glad that they are home!

A congregation of Herons..(this includes all Egrets)..for nesting purposes is called a rookery, heronry or colony. The most common being the rookery..which is sort of amusing since a gathering of rooks is also a rookery! Most of the time, Herons (Egrets) are solitary birds. Only at breeding and nesting times are they social birds. Then they even congregate with other types of Herons..the Blues, Greens, Bitterns and other Egrets. That is what is rather confusing about their behavior now..if it is not nesting season, why the gathering?