88 



THE YOUNG NATURALIST. 



THE ROOK IN CAPTIVITY. 



By F. W. HALFPENNY and S. H. VEALE. 



It is generally acknowledged that the rook is an exceptionally intelligent 

 bird, but until we had experience with several in captivity, we were in 

 ignorance, as we believe many other people are, of the fact that it could 

 be tamed. 



To capture an old rook would seem a rather difficult task, and indeed it is 

 so with the ordinary apparatus, but the march of civilization brings new 

 inventions forth from day to day of which the cunning rook has no ken. One 

 of these is the American wire rat trap, and the birds captured fell easy 

 victims to the bait of a piece of bread, fixed on one of these traps concealed 

 by a little grass. A jackdaw was also caught feeding with the rooks. 



Our first business after securing our birds was to clip their wings and 

 tails, and turn them loose in the garden. At first the loss of their power of 

 flight seemed to puzzle them, but they speedily became used to their new 

 surroundings. In less than two days they would catch any object thrown to 

 them, and in less than a fortnight they would come to food at call. Only 

 when having them under such close observation could we become acquainted 

 with their droll and artful habits, and we then noticed a wide diffeeence 

 between the tameableness and intelligence of the individual birds. 



To gardeners, tame rooks would be invaluable, for they are at work from 

 morning till night digging up insects and grubs. They have also a knack of 

 pulling up small plants to examine the roots, but they are almost sure to 

 capture some grub or insect that would be injurious to the plant when they 

 do so. Our experiments proved that only when in a starving condition will 

 they eat grain ; this they undoubtedly do, and also appear to be fond of a 

 piece of bread. If a mouse were given to them , they would kill it, by a 

 sharp peck upon the head, which spits the 3kull ; they then proceed to skin 

 it. At this business they are wonderfully clever, skinning a mouse completely, 

 and swallowing it in about two minutes. 



We lost one of them through fighting. It was a regular pitched battle, 

 and seemed to result from an old and standing animosity. The defeated 

 bird had both its eyes pecked out and died shortly afterwards. 



It was highly interesting to watch them lay traps for grubs, which they 

 did by making little piles of decaying leaves, or arranging bits of slates in 

 favourable positions ; the material they liked best, however, for this purpose 

 was little pieces of carpet. These they would carefully unroll and place flat 

 down in some moist shady spot. Every morning when let out they would 



