BIRDS IN THE CALENDAR 
some individual rooks retain through life the 
feathers normally missing, but that several 
of the rook's cousins dip into Nature's larder 
in the same fashion without suffering any 
Buch loss. However, the featherless patch on 
the rook's cheeks suffices, whatever its cause, 
as a mark by which to recognise the bird 
living or dead. 
Unlike its cousin the jackdaw, which com- 
monly nests in the cliffs, the rook is not, 
perhaps, commonly associated with the im- 
mediate neighbourhood of the sea, but a 
colony close to my own home in Devonshire 
displays sufficiently interesting adaptation 
to estuarine conditions to be worth passing 
mention. Just in the same way that gulls 
make free of the wireworms on windswept 
ploughlands, so in early summer do the old 
rooks come sweeping down from the elms on 
the hill that overlooks my fishing ground and 
take their share of cockles and other muddy 
fare in the bank uncovered by the falling tide. 
Here, in company with gulls, turnstones, and 
other fowl of the foreshore, the rooks strut 
importantly up and down, digging their 
powerful bills deep in the ooze and occasion- 
46 
