94 WATER BIRDS 
hours. After having been fed, the young heron draws back 
his head until it hes upon his shoulders, and sits there a 
sleepy, solemn-looking hunchback until next feeding-time. 
196. AMERICAN EGRET. — Ardea egretta. 
Famity: The Herons, Egrets, and Bitterns. 
Length : 39.00. 
Adults in Nuptial Plumage: Snowy white; the interscapular plumes 
straight, filamentous, very long, reaching below the end of the tail ; 
head without crest ; bill yellow ; lores orange. 
Young, and Adults after Breeding Season: Same, but lacking the inter- 
scapular plumage. 
Geographical Distribution: Temperate and tropical America, on the 
Pacific coast from Oregon to Patagonia. 
Breeding Range: As far north as Oregon on the Pacific coast. 
Breeding Season: April, May, and June. 
Nest: A loose platform of coarse twigs ; in colonies in trees near, water. 
Eggs: 2to 4; light bluish. Size 2.35 & 1.65. 
THE story of the American Egret is one more tragedy 
in the annals of ornithology, and is “a startling evidence 
of man’s power in the animal world. At his word a 
species is almost immediately wiped out of existence.” 
These beautiful birds are exterminated in Florida, and 
the devastation has begun on the Western coast ; already 
they are listed as “ rare” where they once bred in abun- 
dance. The “nuptial plumage” only is salable, since 
it alone contains the pretty “ aigrette”’ plumes; and so, 
at a time when the true sportsman is bound by an 
unwritten law to protect the nesting birds, the plume- 
hunter shoots them mercilessly for commercial purposes. 
