SCOUTING FOR GIRLS 
413 
EGRETS: PARENT BIRDS 
coats being as white as snow, and the plumes of these 
birds are so beautiful, and human beings have been so 
thoughtless that the Egrets have been almost extermin- 
ated in order to supply the millinery trade. These plumes, 
known as aigrettes, grow on the backs between the shoul- 
ders of both the male and female birds, and are worn 
only during the nesting season. The only time during the 
nesting season that the plume hunter finds it profitable to 
hunt these birds is when the young are in the nest. At any 
other time the birds would be so wild that the plume hunt- 
er could not easily shoot them. When the young are in 
the nest the parental love is so strong that the adult birds 
cannot resist the instinct to return to feed the nestlings 
when they are begging for food. In this way both the 
father bird and the mother bird become an easy prey 
< i 
