it's an ill bird that fouls its own nest

proverb

A condemnation of anyone who damages their own group, reputation or interests.

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Meanings

proverb
  1. A condemnation of anyone who damages their own group, reputation or interests.

    It's an ill bird that fouls his own nest, and we are all Scots folk and all Hieland.

    1893, Robert Louis Stevenson, Catriona
    3 more examples

    They say it's an ill bird that fouls its own nest. My own feeling is that a well-behaved bird will neither foul its own nest nor another's, but that, finding it in any wise foul, it will openly say so, and clean it.

    1872, John Ruskin, The Eagle's Nest

    The saying, “It's an ill bird that fouls its own nest” expresses the most universal of ethical norms, and is probably the source of all such norms.

    2005, Richard Ostrofsky, Sharing Realities: Toward an Epistemology of Conversation, →ISBN, page 173

    He admitted then to having had, for two years, “documents in [his] possession sufficient to have destroyed [the Fenians operating in Montreal], but [he had] thought it was an ill bird that fouled its own nest.

    2013, Charles Macnab, Understanding the Thomas D'Arcy McGee Assassination, →ISBN
Cite this entry
APA

it's an ill bird that fouls its own nest. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 5, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/it's%20an%20ill%20bird%20that%20fouls%20its%20own%20nest

MLA

“it's an ill bird that fouls its own nest.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/it's%20an%20ill%20bird%20that%20fouls%20its%20own%20nest. Accessed November 5, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “it's an ill bird that fouls its own nest,” accessed November 5, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/it's%20an%20ill%20bird%20that%20fouls%20its%20own%20nest.

Source: it's an ill bird that fouls its own nest on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.