Groups of Things

The English language has a wide variety of terms that may be used to refer to groups of things…

affiliation, alliance, amalgamation, ancestors, ancestry, association, band, birth, blood, brethren, brood, brotherhood, bunch, clique, cahoots, children, circle, clan, class, club, coalition, combination, combo, company, confederacy, confederation, congress, conjunction, connection,  coterie, cooperative, corporation, crew, crowd, crush, descendants, descent, dynasty, extraction, folk, forebears, forefathers, faction, folks, fraternity, family, federation, fellowship, fraternity, gang, genealogy, generations, genre, group, guild, group, hookup, house, household, in-laws, incorporation, inheritance, issue, joining,  insiders, league, kin, kind, kindred, kinfolks, line, lineage, ménage, merging, mob, moiety, network, offspring, order, organization, outfit, parentage, partnership, paternity, patrimony, pedigree, people, pool, progenitors, progeny, race, rat pack, relations, relationship, relatives, ring, ring, sect, set, siblings, society, sodality, stock, strain, subdivision, syndicate, system, tie-in, tie-up, tribe, troops, troupe, union, zoo, ...

Groups of animals:

Army of frogs or ants



Bale of turtles 



Band of gorillas 



Baren of mules


Bed of clams or oysters 



Bevy of quail or swans 



Brace of ducks 



Brood of chicks


Business of ferrets


Cast of hawks 



Cete of badgers 



Charm of goldfinches or hummingbirds


Chine of polecats


Cloud of gnats 


Clutch of chicks


Colony of rabbits, ants, gulls and bats


Company of wigeons (they’re dabbling ducks found all over North America)



Congregation of plovers 


Convocation of eagles 



Covert of coots 



Covey of quail or partridge


Cry of hounds


Down of hares 



Draft of fish (That one’s rarely used these days)


Dryft (drift) of tame swine 



Drove of cattle, sheep, pigs 
(In the Middle Ages, cows were also called kine or kyne)


Exaltation of larks 



Fall of woodcocks


Flange of baboons


Flight of birds 



Flock of sheep, geese, ducks 



Gaggle of geese 



Gam of whales 



Gang of elk 



Grist of bees 


Harras of horses 



Herd of cattle, deer, elephants, horses, and sheep
Hive of bees


Horde of gnats 



Hover of trout 



Husk of hares 



Kettle of hawks
Labor of moles


Lepe or leap of leopards 



Leash of foxes 



Litter of pigs, cats, dogs 



Murder of crows 



Murmuration of starlings 



Muster of peacocks 



Mute of hounds 



Nest of rabbits, vipers, turtles and hornets


Nide, or nye of pheasants 



Pack of dogs, hounds, wolves, and mules


Parliament of rooks or owls 



Pod of dolphins, whales or seals


Pride of lions


Raft of ducks (paddling around on water) 



Rafter of turkeys 



Rag of colts


Route of wolves


School of fish (At one time they were called shoals of fish)


Scold of jays


Sculk of foxes


Sedge of cranes, bitterns, herons 
shoal of bass 


Singular of boars


Shrewdness of apes 



Skein of geese (In flight)


Skulk (sculk) of foxes 



Sloth or sleuth of bears 
 


Sounder of wild swine or boars  



Span of mules 



Spring of teal 



Stud of mares 



Swarm of bees


Team of ducks, horses, pigs, oxen 



Tribe of goats 



Troop of kangaroos or monkeys 


Unkindness of ravens



Volary of birds 



Walk of snipe 



Watch of nightingales 



Wedge of swans 



Wing of plovers 



Yoke of oxen


Zeal of zebras