Country diary: a clan of jackdaws takes to the air

Each bird knows which birds to fear and which show them respectThe silent dynamite of morning sunlight blasts a limestone quarry. It's a moment of illumination as the last yellow fire of sallow leaves burns under a sky roiling with wildness. At the quarry's far end, its clan of jackdaws takes to the air. There are 50 or so birds, a fraction of a large corvid society that occupies the Wenlock area, roosts communally at dusk but divides into clans shifting between territories during the day. Continue reading...