140 MICHIGAN BIRD LIFE. 
to those occupied by the Great Blue Heron, and generally associating in 
the same colony with them. For many years they have been known to 
breed in Knox and Gibson counties. We know that it still breeds in some, 
and did very recently in all, of at least six or eight of the counties in northern 
Indiana; also that it is very rarely indeed observed in its northward migra- 
tions before breeding time. This indicates that these herons migrate by 
night. Mr. McBride says that at the heronries at Golden Lake, Steuben 
county [which borders Michigan], for several years, he often saw a few of 
these among the many Great Blue Herons, and while satisfied they nested, 
he could not determine which nest was theirs. Mr. Woodruff says ‘Mr. 
Chas. Eldridge found this bird breeding at Kouts, Porter county, Illinois, 
May 1885, and took a large number of their eggs. He found their nests 
in the same trees with those of the Great Blue Heron. He adds that he 
visited the heronries in June, 1896, and did not see a single specimen of 
the White Egret” (Birds of Indiana, 1897, 660). 
According to Kumlien and Hollister the Greater Egret was a common 
bird on the larger marshes and swamps bordering the inland lakes and 
rivers of Wisconsin 25 to 50 years ago. ‘‘Of late years, thanks to bar- 
barous plume hunters, it is rare, so rare at the present time that three 
or four individuals only visit Lake Koshkonong each year where hundreds 
were found thirty years ago during August and September. Young un- 
able to fly were taken from a colony in-a tamarack swamp near Jeffer- 
son in July 1863. It was found breeding with a large colony of Great 
Blue Herons to the westward of Two Rivers in June, 1880, also reported 
as nesting near Waukesha in 1866” (Birds of Wisconsin, p. 35). 
I can add nothing personally to the life history of this species in Michigan. 
We know that its food is similar to that of the Great Blue Heron; that it 
nests in trees, building bulky nests of sticks, and laying three to five blue 
eggs, rather darker than those of the Great Blue Heron, and averaging 
2.28 by 1.60 inches 
_ Southward, where the species formerly was very abundant and nested 
in large colonies, known as “rookeries” or ‘‘heronries,’”’ there was great 
variation in the position of the nests; sometimes these were placed in the 
tops of lofty trees, even 100 to 150 feet above the ground, at other times 
on low mangroves not six feet above the water, while other nests occupied 
intermediate positions (Baird, Brewer and Ridgway). 
TECHNICAL DESCRIPTION. 
Adult in breeding plumage: Entire plumage snowy white; a train or large bundle 
of long, dissected plumes falls from the middle of the back, their tips almost or quite 
touching the ground when the bird stands erect. Legs and feet black; bill yellow or 
greenish yellow. After the breeding season the long aigrette plumes are lost, but other- 
wise there is little change in the plumage. The young resemble the adults except for the 
absence of the long plumes. Length 37 to 41 inches; wing 14.10 to 16.80; culmen 4.20 
to 4.90; tarsus 5.50 to 6.80. 
