Rooks. Jackdaws. Starlings.
The social disposition of the jackdaw, and its friendliness towards other species of its family, is no doubt favourable in the long run to it; for by mixing with the rooks, both when feeding and roosting, he comes in for a share of the protection extended to that bird in most districts. There is also a sentiment favourable to the jackdaw on account of its partiality for churches and castles: the ‘ecclesiastical’ daws are safe and fearless of man while soaring and playing round the sacred buildings in villages and towns; when they go abroad to forage, and are not with the rooks, there is danger for them, and they are, accordingly, wary and shy of man.
At all seasons the jackdaw loves to consort with his fellows, and to spend a portion of each day in aërial games and exercises: the birds circle about in the air, pursuing and playfully buffeting one another, and tumbling downwards, often from a great height, only to mount aloft again, to renew the mock chase and battle and downward fall. They are loquacious birds, and frequently call loudly to one another, both when perched and when flying; the usual call-note has a clear, sharp, querulous sound, something like the yelping bark of a small dog.
The nest is a rude structure made with sticks, dry grass, leaves, wool, and other materials heaped together, and is large or small according to the situation; when in a church-tower or hollow tree an enormous quantity of material is sometimes used to fill up the cavity. The eggs are four to six in number, and vary much in size, shape, and markings. They are very pale blue, varying to greenish blue, in ground-colour, and are spotted and blotched with blackish brown and olive-brown, with pinkish grey under-markings.
The jackdaw is omnivorous, but subsists principally on worms, grubs, and insects, which it picks up in the pastures where it feeds in company with rooks and starlings. In spring it will eat the newly sown grain, in autumn devours acorns and beech-mast, and in winter will stoop to carrion.
In captivity the jackdaw makes a clever and amusing pet, and may be taught to repeat a few words.
Carrion Crow.
Corvus corone.
Black with green and violet reflections; iris dark hazel; lower part of the beak covered with bristly feathers. Length, nineteen inches.