COMMON HERON. 137 
but an old established colony at Herringfleet, near 
Lowestoft, still exists on the borders of the adjoining 
county.* Mr. Frere, of Yarmouth, has moreover kindly 
ascertained the sites of three heronries which have 
been deserted within the last thirty or forty years. The 
first of these on the estate of Mr. Browne, of Thrigby, 
was visited by Mr. J. H. Gurney about the year 1839, 
when some half-dozen pairs still nested there, but these 
were probably driven away by the rooks. There was 
also a small heronry at Norton Hall, near Loddon, 
some twenty-five years since of which no trace remains ; 
and a rather considerable one at Clippesby, which was 
destroyed in 1834; since which time all the efforts of 
the present owner of the estate have failed to induce 
the birds to build there again. Another small colony 
at Claxton, near Reedham, latterly consisting of but 
two or three pairs, finally deserted that station about 
two years since. 
The heron is one of our earliest breeders, and 
remarkable for the punctuality with which it revisits 
for that purpose its accustomed haunts. Mr. Tyssen- 
Ambhurst in a communication to Mr. Gould’s “ Birds of 
Great Britain,” states that “the Didlington heronry 
is regularly peopled within a day or two of the middle 
of February. There is then a great clattering of bills 
and flapping of wings, with other indisputable evidence 
of their having paired, and that the breeding season is 
about to commence. Early in March three or four eggs 
are laid, and by the middle of April the task of incuba- 
tion has terminated, and the young are hatched.” 
Usually between the 14th and 28th of April I have seen 
young herons in the down, about two or three days old, 
resembling exactly the four nestlings figured by Mr. 
* In Suffolk, also, not so far from our limits as to be quite out 
of reach, 1 am told by Mr. Alfred Newton of small heronries at 
Cavenham and Chippenham. 
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