i86 



THE NATURE BOOK 



and later on, when thousands betake 

 themselves to perch amongst the ever- 

 green plantations, their presence is gener- 

 ally voted a nuisance, not so much on 

 account of the babble of their chatterings 

 as of the pestilential perfume of their 

 droppings. Some 

 compensation for 

 the nuisance and 

 damage caused by 

 their nightly num- 

 bers is to be gained ^!«^'^- 



from watching their 



sheep it may be taken as practically 

 certain that the bird is a Starling, intent 

 upon ridding the sheep of unwelcome 

 guests. It is, perhaps, prompted thereto 

 by the proverbial fellow-feeling, for the 

 Starling itself is a prey to insect para- 

 sites, to which fact may be accounted 

 its winter bathing in roadway pud- 

 dles, from which the passing horse 



YOUNG CARRION CROWS. 



ROOKS' NESTS. 



marvellous evening aerial evolutions, 

 which are continued for some half-hour 

 ere sunset, above and around their much- 

 fought -for perching places. 



Perhaps the most distinctive habit of 

 the Starling, however, so far as the road- 

 side naturalist is concerned, is the bene- 

 ficent service performed by it to the 

 fleecy flock. The larger Jackdaw and 

 Magpie upon occasions also act as sanitary 

 inspectors of living cattle, but should a 

 bird about the size of a Thrush be seen 

 demurely perched upon the broad back 

 of a complacently reclining or grazing 



hoofs have partly removed the icy 

 covering. 



The initial difficulty in dealing with 

 the Crow family is to differentiate between 

 a Rook and a Crow. The Hooded or 

 Grey Crow — specially partial to the neigh- 

 bourhood of the sea-coast, upon which 

 it delights to scavenge — is easily to be 

 distinguished from its cousins by its cos- 

 tume, but the Black or Carrion Crow so 

 closely resembles the Rook in many 

 respects that the two are often confounded. 

 In the hand the two species may at once- 

 be identified by turning back the body 

 feathers, when it will be seen that their 

 bases in the Crow are a dull white, whilst 

 in the Rook they are dark grey. The adult 

 Rook has the space between the eyes and 

 beak \\-hite, warty and bare of feathers, 

 whilst in both Black and Hooded Crow 

 it is covered with bristly feathers. The 

 two Crows are rather larger and heavier- 

 looking birds, and with harsher voices 

 than the Rook, and they are rather solitary 

 than gregarious in their habits, especially 

 in the breeding season ; they never 

 build in colonies as do the Rooks. In 

 strictly corn-growing districts the latter 

 birds entirely disappear from June until 

 harvest time, taking their young to the 

 grass lands where worms and the larvae 



