262 Northern Observations of Inland Birds 



return to feed their young. Yet, despite all this, these 

 birds are among the most plentiful in the land, for, like 

 the starlings, they are found everywhere, often in great 

 numbers where one would least expect to find them. 



There is, however, a reason for this over and above 

 the bird's cleverness in avoiding destruction, for were 

 its favourite haunts identical to those of its first cousins, 

 the jay and the magpie, it would certainly be no more 

 plentiful than they are. The jackdaw owes its abundance 

 chiefly to the fact that security exists for it in the midst 

 of its human foes. 



How many thousands of these birds are safely reared 

 each year in the tiles of churches ? — hence the term 

 ** ecclesiastical daw.'' There, as in the walnut groves 

 of old mansions, or about the buildings themselves, 

 this bird realizes a security unknown to its kind which 

 cling to wilder places. Scarcely a crumbling abbey in 

 the land is without its jackdaw clan, while countless 

 numbers of them haunt inaccessible cliffs, perhaps over- 

 looking the sea, where they are equally safe from shot and 

 powder. The abundance of the jackdaw, then, is as 

 much owing to its choice of safe breeding haunts as to 

 its cleverness and adaptability. 



The two latter characteristics are almost inseparable, 

 as the cleverness of the jackdaw lies largely in its 

 adaptability. In this it surpasses the house sparrow, 

 and closely rivals the starling. The versatility it shows 

 in its choice of breeding haunts is sufficient illustration. 

 The jackdaw will nest anywhere that suggests a sufficient 

 degree of shelter and safety. Hollow trees, crevices in 

 rocks, among the roots of trees overhanging cliffs, rabbit 

 burrows, holes in sandy banks originally made by the 

 martins, and enlarged by kingfishers or the action of 

 the weather. In secluded places I have known them to 

 nest among the piles of rocks left on the ground by bygone 



