The Jackdaw is much more graceful on the wing than its larger allies, and 

 progresses with rapid beats of its long pointed pinions, sometimes swooping 

 down like a Hawk or darting along just above the trees in a zigzag 

 course. 



The food of the Jackdaw consists of worms, grubs, and insects of various 

 kinds, which it obtains in the fields in company with the Rook. It may 

 be seen digging in the turnip-fields for wire-worms or picking up the 

 scattered grain in sowing-time. It also eats acorns and beech-mast in the 

 autumn, and may often be seen on the oak-trees before the acorns have 

 fallen ; fruit is also a welcome change in its diet. In the depth of winter, 

 when other food is scarce, it will eat all sorts of garbage and carrion, 

 sometimes accompanying the Hooded Crows in their search for shell-fish on 

 the seashore. The Jackdaw is undoubtedly a sad robber of eggs, preferring 

 the larger-sized ones, such as pigeon's, grouse's, and mallard's, and though at 

 some seasons of the year the Jackdaw is a very useful bird to the farmer, its 

 depredations among the eggs of the game-birds quite entitle it to a place 

 on the gamekeeper's vermin list. I have seen a pair of Jackdaws carry off 

 the whole contents of a Pheasant's nest, though driven away several times, and 

 a Mallard's nest not far distant shared the same fate. 



The Jackdaw is a later breeder than the Rook, and does not commence 

 the work of nest-building much before the beginning of April. It will 

 build wherever it can find a suitable hole, and its nest may be found in 

 almost every situation, either in the clefts or crannies in the cliffs, on the 

 sea-coast or inland, in windows and loopholes in the walls of ruined castles, 

 among the ivy that covers them, in the spires of churches, in chimneys, in 

 the disused ventilating-shafts of coal-pits, or in any suitable hole in a tree, 

 and occasionally in rabbit-holes. Even the disused nest of another bird is 

 not despised, and I have seen its nest in the foundation of occupied Heron's 

 nests, or in the huge accumulation of sticks in a fir-tree occupied by Rooks. 

 The size of the nest depends on the peculiarities of the site. In a small 

 hole it may be only a handful of moss, grass, and sheep's wool, but in such 

 situations as a large hollow tree several wheel-barrow loads of sticks are often 

 collected to make a foundation for the nest proper. In Tweedsmuir, where 

 suitable holes were scarce, I found a small colony of Jackdaws nesting in the 

 tops of thick spruce firs in a plantation by the roadside. The nests were 

 huge collections of rubbish, moss, wool, paper, rags, and sticks of all 

 sizes, and even a few old wooden matchboxes. The nests were not covered 

 over, but were quite open, like the Rook's, two or three being often built close 



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