Collective Terms for Animals



This section is a pretty comprehensive list of Collective Terms for Animals. Many will be familiar but others will be unheard of, deriving from 15th century witticisms or literary imagination, and some are simply archaic or erroneous. There are also some terms for pairs of animals and groups of three animals.


The list has been arranged alphabetically.


Here is the list of Collective Terms for Groups of Animals beginning with S.


animal group or collective term notes
 
salmon bind  
leap possibly invented
run  
draught  
 
sandpipers fling  
 
sardines family  
 
seafowl cloud  
 
sea horses herd possibly invented
 
seals herd  
pod  
rookery  
 
sheep down  
drift when driven in a group
drove when driven in a group
flock standard
herd  
hurtle  
meinie  
mob  
parcel  
trip  
 
sheldrake dopping  
 
smelts quantity  
 
snails escargatoire  
rout  
walk  
 
snakes bed probably a nesting place, not a collective noun
den probably a nesting place, not a collective noun
trogle literary
knots (young)  
trogle literary
 
snipe walk  
whisp or wisp  
 
sparrows host  
meinie  
tribe  
 
spiders cluster or clutter  
 
squirrels colony  
dray or drey probably strictly, the nest
 
starlings chattering  
clattering  
cloud  
congregation  
murmuration  
 
sticklebacks shoal  
spread possibly invented
 
stoats pack  
trip  
 
storks flight  
mustering  
phalanx migrating
 
swallows flight  
gulp  
 
swans bank on the ground
bevy  
drift  
eyrar  
game  
herd  
lamentation possibly fanciful
sownder  
team  
wedge (in flight)  
whiting  
 
swifts flock  
 
swine, tame doylt  
drift  
  trip  
 
swine drove when driven in a group
herd  
 
swine, wild sounder (twelve or more)  
 
swordfish flotilla possibly invented
 



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