Rookery

A rookery is a special place where some animals, especially birds, come together to have babies and take care of their young. The word comes from the way rooks live. Rooks are a type of bird in the crow family. They build many nests close together in tall trees, making a busy group.

We use the word rookery for many other animals too, like corvids, seabirds, marine mammals such as true seals and sea lions, and even some turtles.

Because of how rooks live, people in the past sometimes used the word rookery to describe crowded and poor neighborhoods in cities, especially in London, long ago. Scientists think some ancient flying reptiles called pterosaurs, like a species named Pterodaustro, may have also lived in groups like modern rooks. This shows that living in groups has been around for a very long time.