beautiful plumage, and when seen flying across an open sunlit space is
nearly as conspicuous as a magpie. But among the dense foliage of the
woods and thickets he inhabits it is as difficult to see a jay as a
wood-wren; and it is doubtless owing to this fact, and to his extreme
wariness and cunning, that he still survives in many parts of England
where the magpie has now been extirpated, although both species are
pursued by gamekeepers with the same stupid and deadly animosity. In
Scotland he is said to be decreasing more rapidly than in England,
probably because the Scotch are more thorough than the Southrons,
especially in the process of stamping out: in Ireland it is found only
in the southern half of the island, where it is somewhat scarce.
The most striking characteristic of the jay is its tireless energy, and
a liveliness of disposition and alertness almost without a parallel
among British birds; even the restless, prying, chattering magpie seems
a quiet creature beside it; and as to the other corvine birds, they are
by comparison a sedate family. Like the magpie, he is an excitable and
vociferous bird, and has a curious and varied language. When disturbed
in his woodland haunts he utters a scream that startles the hearer, so
loud and harsh and piercing is it. Richard Jefferies well describes
it as being like the sound made in tearing a piece of calico. He also
has a lower, monotonous, rasping note, which he will continue uttering
for half an hour at a time when his curiosity or suspicion has been
excited. In the love season he utters a variety of sounds by way of
song, and as they resemble the notes of the starling, sparrow, and
other birds, he is supposed to be a mocker. In captivity he can be
taught to speak a few words; but it is possible that the various sounds
composing his vocal performance in the woods are his own.
In spring he becomes somewhat social, and unites in noisy parties; at
other times he is solitary, or lives with his mate.
Owing to an excessively wary and suspicious habit, engendered by much
persecution, it is difficult to observe him narrowly for any length of
time. In the woods and plantations, few and far between, where jays are
not persecuted, and do not associate the human figure with a sudden
shower of murderous pellets, he will allow a nearer approach, and it is
then a rare pleasure to study him on his perch. He does not, as a rule,
rest long in one place, and when perched is of so active and excitable
a temper that he cannot keep still for three seconds at a stretch.
The wings and tail are raised, and depressed, and flirted, the crest
alternately lowered and elevated, the head turned from side to side, as
the wild, bright eyes glance in this or that direction. If he should by
chance place himself where a stray sunbeam falls through the foliage
on him, lighting up his fine reddish brown plumage, variegated with
black and white and beautiful blue, he shows as one of the handsomest
birds that inhabit the woodlands.
The jay makes his nest in a bush or sapling at no great height from the
ground; the lower branch of a large tree is sometimes made choice of,
where the nest is well concealed by the close foliage; a thick holly or
other evergreen is also a favourite site. The nest is built of sticks
and twigs, sometimes mixed with mud, and the cup-shaped cavity is
lined with fine roots. Four to seven eggs are laid, pale greyish green
in ground-colour, thickly freckled, and spotted all over with pale
olive-brown. The young birds follow their parents for some weeks after
leaving the nest.
The jay is omnivorous, but in summer feeds mainly on slugs, worms,
grubs, and insects of all kinds; in this season he devours berries and
fruit--plums, cherries, also peas and currants; and in autumn, nuts,
beech-mast, and acorns. He also plunders the smaller birds of their
eggs and young, and is said to carry off pheasant and partridge chicks.
He is a keen mouser, and after killing a mouse with two or three sharp
blows on the head, strips the skin off before devouring it. Like the
nuthatch and some other species, he has the habit of concealing the
food he does not want to eat at once.
Magpie.
Pica rustica.
Head, throat, neck, and back velvet-black; scapulars and under plumage
white; tail much graduated, and, as well as the wings, black, with
lustrous blue and green reflections; beak and feet black. Length,
eighteen inches.
* * * * *
In spite of his evil reputation, the magpie is regarded by most
persons who are not breeders of pheasants with exceptional interest,
and even affection. He has some very attractive qualities, and is one
of that trio of corvine birds--pie, chough, and jay--from which it is
difficult to single out the most beautiful. The most conspicuous he
undoubtedly is, in his black and white plumage; and his figure, with
its long, graduated tail, is also the most elegant. In his habits there
is abundant variety, and in sagacity he is probably unsurpassed by
any member of the corvine family, which counts so many wily brains.
His excessive cunning and rapid rate of increase have probably
served to save him from the fate that has overtaken the hen harrier
and marsh-harrier, and many another beautiful member of the British
avifauna. As it is, he has been almost extirpated throughout a large
part of England and Scotland. In Ireland, however, he is still a common
species, but, oddly enough, he is not indigenous to that country. It
is believed that he first appeared there about, or a little more than,
two centuries and a half ago. How he got there is not known. According
to Yarrell, there is a widespread belief in Ireland that the magpie was
imported into that island by the English out of spite.
[Illustration: FIG. 55.--MAGPIE. ⅑ natural size.]
The magpie is as singular in his motions, gestures, and flight as he is
beautiful in colour and elegant in form. On the wing he appears most
conspicuous when the white webs of the quills are displayed. The wings
are very short, and the flight is slow and somewhat wavering, and at
every three or four yards there is an interval of violent wing-beats,
during which the black and white of the quills mix and become nearly
grey. High in the air he has a most curious appearance; as a rule he
flies low, passing from tree to tree, or along the side of a hedge.
He seeks his food on the ground, and his movements are then utterly
unlike those of any other ground-feeder. His manner of running and
hopping about, flinging up his tail; his antics and little, excited
dashes, now to this side, now to that, give the idea that he is amusing
himself with some solitary game rather than seeking food. Richard
Jefferies has given so accurate and vivid a picture of the bird in his
‘Wild Life in a Southern County’ that I cannot refrain from quoting
it in this place. ‘To this hedge the hill-magpie comes; some magpies
seem to keep entirely to the downs, while others range the vale, though
there is no apparent difference between them. His peculiar uneven,
and, so to say, flickering flight marks him out at a distance, as he
jauntily journeys along beside the slope. He visits every fir-copse
and beech-clump in his way, spending some time, too, in and about the
hawthorn hedge, which is a favourite spot. Sometimes in the spring,
when the corn is yet short and green, if you glance carefully through
an opening in the bushes, or round the side of the gateway, you may see
him busy on the ground. His rather excitable nature betrays itself in
every motion: he walks, now to the right a couple of yards, now to the
left in quick zigzag, so working across the field towards you; then,
with a long rush, he makes a lengthy traverse at the top of his speed;
turns, and darts away again at right angles; and presently up goes his
tail, and he throws his head down with a jerk of the whole body, as if
he would thrust his beak deep into the earth. This habit of searching
the field, apparently for some favourite grub, is evidence in his
favour that he is not so entirely guilty as he has been represented of
innocent blood. No bird could be approached in that way. All is done in
a jerky, nervous manner. As he turns sideways, the white feathers show
with a flash above the green corn; another moment, and he looks all
black.’
In disposition the magpie is restless, inquisitive, excitable, and
loquacious. Where he is greatly persecuted by gamekeepers--as, indeed,
is the case almost everywhere in England--he grows so wary that, in
spite of his conspicuous colouring, it would be almost impossible to
get a glimpse of him, were it not for his outbursts of irrepressible
excitement and garrulity. The sight of a stoat, fox, or prowling cat
will instantly cause him to forget the more dangerous keeper and
his gun, and to fill the coppice with cries of alarm. The feathered
inhabitants of the wood hurry from all sides to ascertain the cause of
the outcry, and assist in driving out the intruder. But the keeper,
too, hears; this is the opportunity he has been long watching and
waiting for; and if he approaches the scene of excitement with due
caution, poor beautiful Mag, dead, and shattered with shot, will soon
be added to his festering trophies.
The usual sound emitted by the magpie is an excited chatter--a note
with a hard, percussive sound, rapidly repeated half a dozen times. It
may be compared to the sound of a wooden rattle, or to the bleating of
a goat; but there is always a certain resemblance to the human voice
in it, especially when the birds are unalarmed, and converse with one
another in subdued tones. But it is more like the guttural voice of the
negro than the white man’s voice. Their subdued chatter has sometimes
produced in me the idea that I was listening to the low talking and
laughing of a couple of negroes lying on their backs somewhere near. It
is well known that this bird can be taught to articulate a few words.
The magpie is a notable architect, and as a rule builds his nest in a
tall tree in or on the borders of a wood; sometimes in a low, isolated
tree or large bush, or in the centre of a thick hedge. It is large, and
formed of sticks and mud, with a hollow in the centre, plastered with
mud and lined with fibrous roots; over this solid platform and nest a
large dome of loosely interwoven thorny sticks is built, with a hole in
the side just large enough to admit the bird.
Magpies pair for life, and the nest may serve the birds for several
years, a little repairing work being bestowed on it each spring. The
eggs are usually six in number, but in some cases as many as nine are
laid. In colour they are pale bluish green, very thickly spotted and
freckled with olive-brown, and faintly blotched with ash-colour.
The magpie may be easily tamed; even the wild birds, when not
persecuted, become strongly familiar with man, and come about the house
like fowls. In a state of nature he subsists on grubs, worms, snails,
slugs, and various insects, and will eat any kind of animal food that
offers, not excepting carrion; he also devours young birds and eggs,
and is fond of ripe fruit. He is supposed to be a deadly enemy of the
poultry-yard, and a stealer of pheasant and partridge chicks; but it is
certain that his depredations have been greatly exaggerated.
Jackdaw.
Corvus monedula.
Crown and upper parts black with violet reflections; back of the head
and nape grey; iris white; under parts dull black. Length, fourteen
inches.
* * * * *
It is hard to pronounce which of our indigenous corvine species is the
most interesting. They are all wonderful birds; and to those who have
made pets of, and studied them, and know them intimately as most of us
know our dogs, they appear to excel other feathered creatures in the
quality of _mind_, just as thrushes, larks, and warblers do in
that of melody, and as terns and others of the more aërial kinds excel
in graceful motions. If the jackdaw is not the first of his family in
intelligence, he is certainly not behind any of them. In beauty he
does not compete with the three species already described--chough,
jay, and pie--and at a distance is only a lesser rook or carrion crow
in appearance; but there is a peculiar look about this bird when seen
closely that engages and holds the attention more than mere beauty
or grace. When he is sitting in repose, his head drawn in and beak
inclining downwards, and turns his face to you, it does not look quite
like a bird’s face: the feathers puffed out all round make the head
appear preternaturally large, and the two small, bright, whitish grey
eyes set close together in the middle have an expression of craft that
is somewhat human and a little uncanny.
The jackdaw is one of the birds that the gamekeeper wars against
without ruth, shooting and trapping them in the breeding season,
especially when they are occupied in feeding their young, and can
be seen and easily shot in their frequent journeys to and from the
nesting-tree. But the jackdaw is not so easy to extirpate as some of
its congeners. He is probably just as common as he ever was, while
the chough is rapidly dying out, and crow and jay and pie are yearly
diminishing in numbers, and the raven, driven from its inland haunts,
clings to existence in the wildest and most inaccessible parts of
the coast. The reason of this is that the jackdaw is more adaptive
than the other species. He has been compared in this respect to the
house-sparrow, for he can exist in town as well as country, and readily
adapts himself to new surroundings. The variety of sites he uses for
breeding purposes shows how plastic are his habits. He breeds apart
from his fellows, like the carrion crow; or in communities, like the
rook and chough. He builds in hollow trees in parks and woods, in
rabbit-burrows, in ruins, church-towers, and buildings of all kinds;
and in holes and crevices in cliffs, whether inland or facing the
sea, where he lives in company with the rock-pigeon and the puffin.
‘At Flamborough,’ Seebohm says, ‘the jackdaws are very abundant. A
republican might call them the aristocracy of the cliffs. Like the
modern noble, or the monks of the Middle Ages, they contrive to
eat the fat of the land without any ostensible means of living. They
apparently claim an hereditary right in the cliffs; for they catch
no fish, and do no work, but levy blackmail on the silly guillemots,
stealing the fish which the male has brought to the ledges for the
female, upsetting the egg of some unfortunate bird who has left it for
a short time, and devouring as much of its contents as they can get
hold of, when the egg is broken, on some ledge of rock or in the sea.’
[Illustration: 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.
* * * * *
The common, black, or carrion crow so closely resembles the rook in
form, size, and colouring as to be indistinguishable from it when seen
at a distance. Viewed nearer it is seen to have the base of the beak
clothed with feathers, instead of naked and grey, as is the case in
the more common bird. The young rook may, however, be mistaken for a
crow even when very near, as its face is feathered like the crow’s. In
voice the two birds differ, that of the crow being louder and very much
harsher--more like the raven’s croak than the familiar hoarse, but not
disagreeable, caw of the rook. In summer he may be identified by his
solitary habits. He has a very much worse reputation than the species
he so nearly resembles: both game-preserver and farmer regard him as a
pest, and he is said to be the most persecuted bird in this country.
But somehow, in spite of all that is done to extirpate him utterly,
he manages to keep a pretty strong hold on life, although he is not
common. He inhabits all of the British Islands, chiefly England and
Wales; in the central and northern parts of Scotland, and in Ireland,
he is rarely met with, his place in those countries being taken by the
hooded crow. When not engaged in breeding the crow is to some extent
gregarious, and is also social, associating both in the fields and at
roosting-time with rooks and jackdaws. And it is probable that this
habit has been of great advantage to him, and may even have saved the
species from extermination, for while among the rooks he easily passes
for a rook. That he is exceptionally sagacious, and very careful to
keep out of reach of his deadly human enemies, goes without saying;
he is a member of a family ranking high in intelligence; and being so
large and conspicuous a bird, his life is one of incessant danger. In
selecting a site for his nest his intelligence is sometimes at fault.
Not only is the nest a large structure, but, with a strange fatuity,
the bird will at times build in a conspicuous place near a house.
On the coast he is, like the raven and jackdaw, a nester in cliffs;
inland he usually builds in or on a large tree, and if the nest is
allowed to remain he will use it for several years. The nest is a large
platform, made of sticks, weeds, pieces of turf, and other materials,
with a hollow in the centre neatly lined with fine grass, wool, hairs,
and feathers. The eggs are four to six in number, in ground-colour pale
bluish green, spotted and blotched with various shades of olive-brown,
with purplish grey underlying blotches.
When there are young to feed the crow is exceedingly active; he is
then most destructive to young pheasants and other game, and is a
troublesome neighbour to the poultry. Young and weakly birds are
dropped upon and picked up with astonishing adroitness and rapidity.
He will pounce upon and carry off any small and easily conquered
animal to satisfy his nestful of voracious young. At other times he
is omnivorous: a carrion-eater like the raven, and devourer of dead
stranded fish and other animal refuse cast up by the sea; in the
pastures he searches for worms and grubs with the rooks; and when
occasion offers he feeds on grain, berries, walnuts, and fruit. He
appears to have a greater appetite than most species: he is said to be
the first bird astir in the morning, and from dawn until sunset he is
engaged incessantly in seeking food.
His flight resembles that of the rook, but is somewhat heavier.
Hooded Crow.
Corvus cornix.
Head, throat, wings, and tail black; the rest of the plumage ash-grey;
iris brown. Length, nineteen and a half inches.
* * * * *
This bird, which is also known as the hoodie, Royston crow, grey or
grey-backed crow, and by other names, is now regarded by some of our
first authorities on such subjects as a form of the carrion crow. In
England and Wales it is very rare. In Ireland, where the black crow
is almost unknown, it is common; it is also found throughout Scotland
and the Western Islands as a resident breeding species. In winter,
hooded crows visit the east coast of England in large numbers, and
are specially abundant on the Lincolnshire coast, where they feed on
shellfish and animal refuse left by the tide on the extensive mud
flats. These seaside crows that wait on the tide come to us from the
north of Europe, and leave our shores in spring.
Excepting in the matter of colour--one bird being wholly black and the
other grey on the back and under parts--the black and grey crows are
identical in size, language, and in all their habits, and what has been
said of the carrion crow applies to the present species.
Rook.
Corvus frugilegus.
Black with purple and violet reflections; base of the beak, nostrils,
and region round the beak bare of feathers, and covered with a white
scurf; iris greyish white. Length, eighteen inches.
* * * * *
The rook is common throughout the British Islands, and is our
best-known large land bird, being everywhere the most abundant species,
as well as the most conspicuous, owing to his great size, blackness,
gregariousness, and habits of perching and nesting on the tops of
trees, and of feeding on open grass spaces, where it is visible at
a long distance. Without being a favourite of either the gamekeeper
or the farmer, he is, in a measure, a protected species, the rookery
being looked on as a pleasant and almost indispensable appanage of
the country-house. It was not always so. In former times the rook was
regarded as a highly injurious bird, and in the reign of Henry VIII.
an Act of Parliament was passed to ensure its destruction. But this is
ancient history. The existing sentiment, which is so favourable to the
bird, probably had its origin centuries back in time, and the rook has
everywhere come to regard the trees that are near a human habitation as
the safest to build on. It is surprising to find how fearless of man he
is in this respect, while retaining a suspicious habit towards him when
at a distance from home. I recall one rookery on a clump of fir-trees
so close to a large house that, from the top windows, one can look down
on the nests and count the eggs in many of them; yet for miles round
the area is a well-wooded park, where the birds might easily have found
scores of sites as well or better suited to their requirements.
[Illustration: FIG. 56.--ROOKS AND NEST.]