300 AMERICAN ORNITHOLOGY. 



NEST AND EGGS. 



Blue Herons build bulky but shabby nests of sticks and twigs, plac- 

 ing them in trees at various elevations from the ground depending up- 

 on the locality and the chances of their remaining undisturbed. In the 

 south they usually build in large communities called heronries and the 

 nests may be found at various altitudes from ten to one hundred feet 

 above the earth ; generally in the northern part of their range, but a 

 few pairs are found breeding in one place and these usually in the tops 

 of high trees in swampy territory. Their eggs are laid from April in 

 the south to June in the north and the number is usually three or four. 

 The eggs are pale bluish green and vary in shape from ovate to elliptical. 



HABITS. 



These imposing birds are the largest of the Heron family to be found 

 within our limits. An old adult bird is a strikingly beautiful object, 

 the long white plumes streaming from the breast reaching nearly to the 

 ground, while the black ones from the back of his head fall upon his 

 back while in a resting attitude. The young just before flight are as 

 ugly looking and awkward as their parents are graceful, their long legs 

 and neck seeming to be forever in the way, to their great discomfiture, 

 while their heads are swayed from side to side and moved backward 

 and forward in their endeavors to properly focus their eyes upon any 

 intruder into their home. For a week before attempting flight the 

 young clamber about among the sticks composing their nest and upon 

 branches in the immediate neighborhood, their steps being very wobbly 

 and uncertain, and their long toes tightly wound about the slender 

 branches, holding on for dear life. Who would ever suppose that this 

 ungainly bundle of awkwardness would ever attain the grace and beauty 

 displayed by the old birds ? 



