Birds in Town and Village

W >> W. H. Hudson >> Birds in Town and Village

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One winter, a few years ago, I was staying for a few days at a cottage
facing Silchester Common, and on going out after breakfast to feed the
birds I particularly noticed a male grey wagtail among those that came
to me, on account of its beauty and tameness. Every morning I fed it,
and on my speaking to my landlady about it she said, "Oh, we know that
bird well; this is the fourth winter it has spent with us, but it always
came before with its mate. The poor little thing had only one leg, but
managed to hop about and feed very well; this year the poor thing didn't
turn up with its mate, so we suppose it had met its death somewhere
during the summer."

I have often watched the gatherings of pied wagtails (always with a
certain number of the grey species among them) in places where they
spend the winter in our southern counties, at some spot where they are
accustomed to congregate each evening to hold a sort of frolic before
going to roost, and it has always appeared to me that the birds, both
pied and grey, were in pairs. So too, in watching the starlings day
after day in the field in front of my window. Well able with my
binocular to observe them closely, I saw much to convince me that the
starling, too, lives all the year with his mate.

Each morning the birds that had made our village their daily
feeding-ground, would, on arrival from the roosting-place in one body,
break up into numerous small parties of half a dozen to twenty or more
birds. All day long these little flocks were hurrying about from field
to field, spending but a short time at one spot, so hungry were they and
anxious to find a more productive one, and in every field they would
meet and mix with other small groups, and presently all would fly, and
breaking up into small parties again go off in different directions.
Thus one had a constant succession of little flocks in the field from
morning till night, and I found from counting the birds in each small
group that in three cases in four they were in even numbers. Again, I
have often seen a group of three, five, seven or nine birds on the
field, and after a while a solitary starling from a neighbouring field
or from some treetop near by has flown down to join the group and make
the numbers even.

The birds when feeding, I have said, are always in a desperate hurry,
and little wonder, since after a night, usually wet and cold, of from
sixteen to eighteen hours and only about six to feed in, they must be in
a half-starved state and frantic to find something to swallow. No sooner
do they alight than they begin running about, prodding with their beaks,
and all the time advancing, the birds keeping pretty well abreast. Now,
from time to time you will notice that a bird finds something to delay
him and is left behind by the others. On they go--prod, prod, then a
little run, then prod, prod again and run again--while he, excited over
his find, and vigorously digging at the roots of the grass, lets them go
on without him until he is yards behind. Whenever this happens you will
see one of the advancing birds pause in its prodding to look back from
time to time as if anxious about the one left behind; and by and by this
same bird, its anxiety increasing, will suddenly spring into the air and
fly back to place itself at the side of the other, to wait quietly until
it has finished its task; and no sooner does the busy one put up its
head to signal that he is ready than up they spring and fly together on
to the flock. No one witnessing this action can doubt for a moment that
these two are mates, and that wherever they paired and bred
originally--in Lincoln or York or Thurso or perhaps in one of the
western islands--they paired for life and will stick together, summer
and winter and in all their wanderings, as long as they live.

Until one observes starlings in this close way, even to their minutest
actions--I had indeed little else to do during my three winter months in
this nursing-home--it is only natural to believe that among gregarious
species the starling is one of those least likely to pair for life,
seeing that in it the gregarious instinct is intensified and more highly
developed than in most others. One would suppose that the flock, which
is like an organism--that is to say, the attachment to the flock--would,
out of the breeding season, take the place of the close relation or
companionship between bird and bird seen in species known to pair for
life. Only the pairing passion, one would suppose, could serve to
dissolve the company of birds and this only for a brief season of about
a couple of months' duration. There is but one brood raised in the
season, and the whole business of reproduction is well over before the
end of June. Later breeders are those that have lost their first eggs or
broods. And no sooner are the young brought off and instructed in the
starling's sole vocation (except his fruit-eating) of extracting the
grubs it subsists on from the roots of the grass--a business which
detains them for a week or two--than the married life is apparently over
and the communal life resumed. The whole life of the bird is then
changed; the sole tie appears to be that of the flock; home and young
are forgotten: the birds range hither and thither about the land, and by
and by migrate to distant places, some passing oversea, while others
from the northern counties and from Scotland and the islands come down
to the south of England, where they winter in millions and myriads.
There they form the winter habit of congregating in immense numbers in
the evening at their favourite roosting-places, and hundreds and
thousands of small flocks, which during the daylight hours exist
distributed over an area of hundreds of square miles all make to one
point and combine into one flock. At such times they actually appear to
rejoice in their own incalculable numbers and gather earlier than they
need at the roosting-place, so that the whole vast gathering may spend
an hour or so in their beloved aerial exercises.

To anyone who witnesses these gatherings and sees the birds rising from
time to time from the wood, and appearing like a big black cloud in the
sky, growing lighter and darker alternately as the birds scatter wide or
mass themselves in a closer formation, until after wheeling about for
some minutes they pour back into the trees; and who listens to the noise
they make, as of a high wind in the wood, composed, as it is, of an
infinity of individual voices, it must seem incredible that all these
birds can keep in pairs. For how could any couple hold together in such
circumstances, or when separated ever meet again in such a multitude,
or, should they ever meet by chance, how recognize one another when all
are exactly alike in size, shape, colour and voice?

They can, and certainly do, keep together, and when forced apart as,
when pursued by a hawk, they scatter in all directions, they can quickly
find one another again. They can do it because of their perfect
discipline, or instinct, or the perfection of the system they follow
during their autumn and winter wanderings and migrations.

The breeding season over, the birds in each locality unite in a small
flock composed of twenty or thirty to fifty or more pairs and start
their wandering life. Those in the north migrate or drift south, and
vast numbers, as we see, spend the winter in the southern counties. And
here they have their favourite roosting-places and are accustomed to
assemble in tens and hundreds of thousands. But the original small flock
composed of a few pairs, is never broken up--never absorbed by the
multitude. Each morning when it is light enough, the birds quit the
roosting-wood, but not all together; they quit it in flocks, flock
following flock so closely as to appear like a continuous stream of
birds, and the streams flow out in different directions over the
surrounding country. Each stream of birds is composed of scores and
hundreds of units, and each unit drops out of the stream and slopes away
to this or that side, to drop down on its own chosen feeding-ground, to
which it returns morning after morning through the winter. When all the
units have dropped out and settled on their feeding areas for the day,
it may be seen that the whole country within a circuit of ten or twelve
or more miles from the roosting-place has been occupied, that each flock
has its own territory, where it splits up into some groups and spends
its short hours flying about and exploring every green field, and one
might almost say "every grass." One can only explain this perfect
distribution by assuming that each unit instinctively looks for
unoccupied ground in its winter habitat, and that consequently there is
very little overlapping. It must also be assumed that at the place of
assembly in the evening each flock has its own roosting-place--its own
trees and bushes where the members of the flock can still keep together
and to which after each aerial performance they can return. The flock
comes back to sleep on its own tree, and no doubt every couple roosts
side by side on its own twig.

On the return of Spring the birds do not migrate in a body, but slip
away, flock by flock, to reappear about the end of April in their old
breeding-place in the North Country, with, perhaps, the loss of a few
members--the one that was old and died in the season of scarcity; and
one that was taken at the roost by a brown owl, and one that had its
feet frozen to the perch; and was killed by a jackdaw when struggling to
free itself; and one that was struck down by a sparrow-hawk on his
homeward journey.

What I have so far been unable to trace is the career of the young after
August. We see that once they are able to fend for themselves they club
together in small flocks and continue together during their "brown
thrush" stage, but by and by they get the adult plumage and language and
are no longer distinguishable as young. Do they, then, join the old
birds before the wandering and migrating south begins? And do they pair
or not before the winter?

III

VILLAGE BIRDS IN WINTER

Throughout the winter of 1915-16, and more particularly during my three
months in the hospital at Hayle, from the beginning of December to
March, I was greatly impressed at the perpetual state of hunger in which
the birds exist, especially the three commonest species in our
village--rook, daw, and starling. Little wonder that the sight of a
piece of bread thrown out on the green field below my window would bring
all these three and many others with a rush from all sides, every one
eager to get a morsel! But the birds that live most in a groove, as it
were, like the rook and starling, and have but one kind of food and one
way of finding it, are always the worst off in winter. These subsist on
the grubs and other minute organisms they are able to pick out of the
grass roots, and are life workers paid by the piece who must labour hard
and incessantly to make enough to keep themselves alive; their winter
life is accordingly in startling contrast to that of the daw--one that
lives on his wits and fares better and altogether has an easier and more
amusing time.

It was the habit of the three species named to quit the wood where they
roosted as soon as it was light enough for them to feed, the time
varying according to the state of the weather from half-past eight to
ten o'clock, the mornings being usually wet and dark. The rooks that had
their rookery in the village numbered forty or fifty birds, and these
would remain at the village, getting their food in the surrounding
fields for the rest of the day. The daws would appear in a body of two
or three hundred birds, but after a little while many of them would go
on to their own villages further away, leaving about sixty to eighty
birds belonging to the village. Last of all the starlings would appear
in flocks and continuous streams of birds often fighting their way
against wind and rain, leaving about a couple of hundred or more behind,
these being the birds that had settled in the village for the season,
and worked in the grass fields in and surrounding it. Rooks and
starlings would immediately fall to work, while the daws, the flock
breaking up into small parties of three or four, would distribute
themselves about the village and perch on the chimney-pots. They would
perch and then fly, and for all the rest of the day would be incessantly
shifting about from place to place, on the look-out for something to
eat, dropping from time to time to snatch up a crust of bread or the
core of an apple thrown away by a child in the road, or into a back
garden or on to a dust-heap where potato-parings and the head of a
mackerel or other refuse had been thrown. They were very bold, but not
as courageous as the old-time British kite that often swooped to snatch
the bread from a child's hand.

From time to time one, or a pair, of a small party of these daws would
drop down on the field before my window when the rooks and starlings
were there prodding busily at the turf, but though I watched them a
thousand times I never detected them trying to find something for
themselves. They simply stood or walked about among the working birds,
watching them intently. Grub-finding was an art they had not acquired,
or were too indolent or proud to practise; but they were not too proud
to beg or steal; they simply watched the other birds in the hope of
being able to snatch up a big unearthed grub and run away with it. As a
rule after a minute or two they would get tired of waiting and rush off
with a lively shout. Back they would go to the chimney-pots and to their
flying up and down, suspending their flight over this or that yard or
garden, and by and by one would succeed in picking up something big, and
at once all the other daws in sight would give chase to take it from
him; for these village daws are not only parasites and cadgers, but
worse--they are thieves without honour among themselves.

In spite of all the time and energy wasted in their perpetual races and
chases going on all over the village, every bird exerting himself to the
utmost to rob all he can from his pals, they get enough to eat; for when
the day is over and other daws from other villages drop in to visit
them, all unite in a big crowd and wheel about, making the place ring
with their merry yelping cries, before sailing away to the wood. One
might say after witnessing and listening to this evening performance
that they have great joy in their rascally lives.

But for the poor starling there is little joy in these brief, dark, wet
winter days, even if there is little frost in this West Cornwall
climate. A frost of a few days' duration would be fatal to incalculable
numbers, especially if, as in the great frosts of the winters of 1894-5
and 1896-7, severest in the south and west of England, it should come
late in winter, I think it can be taken as a fact that a long or
overseas migration takes place before midwinter or not at all. In
January and February, when birds are driven to the limits of the land by
a great cold they do not cross the sea, either because they are too weak
to attempt such an adventure or for some other reason unknown to us. We
see that on these occasions they come to the seashore and follow it
south and west even to the western extremity of Cornwall, and then
either turn back inland or wait where they are for open weather, many
perishing in the meantime.

During those three winter months, when I watched the starlings at work
on the field before my hospital window, they appeared to be in a
perpetual state of extreme hunger and were always running over the
ground, rapidly prodding as they moved, and apparently finding their
food almost exclusively on the surface--that is to say, on the surface
of the soil but under the grass, at its surface roots. At other seasons
they go deep when they know from the appearance of every blade of grass
whether or not there is a grub feeding on its roots beneath the surface.
Without shooting and examining the stomachs of a large number of
starlings it was not possible to know just what the food consisted of;
but with my strong binocular on them I could make out that at almost
every dig of the beak something was picked up, and could actually see it
when the beak was held up with the minute morsel at its tip--a small,
thread-like, semi-transparent worm or grub in most instances. Two or
three of these atomies would hardly have made a square meal for a
ladybird, and I should think that a starling after swallowing a thousand
would fed very hungry. And on many days this scanty, watery food had to
be searched for in very painful conditions, as it rained heavily on most
days and often all day long. At such times the birds in their sodden
plumage looked like drowned starlings fished out of a pool and
galvanized into activity. Nor were they even seen to shake the wet
off--a common action in swallows and other birds that feed in the rain;
they were too hungry, too anxious to find something to eat to keep the
starling soul and body together before the long night of eighteen or
twenty hours would overtake them.

No doubt the winter of 1915-16 was exceptionally wet and cold, although
without any severe frosts; a long frost in February, when the birds were
most reduced, would probably have proved fatal to at least half their
number. But though it continued wet and cold, things began to mend for
the starlings towards the end of February, and in March the improvement
was very marked; they were not in such a perpetual hurry; their time was
longer now, and by the end of the month their working day had increased
from five or six to twelve or fourteen hours, and the light had
increased and grubs were easier to find. By April, the starlings no
longer appeared to be the same species as the poor, rusty, bedraggled
wretches we had been accustomed to see; they are now lively, happy birds
with a splendid gloss on their feathers and beaks as bright a yellow as
the blackbird's. Finally, in April they left us, not going in a body,
but flock by flock, day after day, until by the end of the month all
were gone back to their homes in the north--all but the two or three to
half a dozen pairs in each village. And these few that stay behind are
new colonists in West Cornwall.

IV

INCREASING BIRDS IN BRITAIN

About the daw, or Jackie, or Dorrie or Jackie-Dorrie, as he is variously
and familiarly called, and his village habits, there will be more to say
presently; just now my concern is with another matter--a veritable daw
problem.

For the last twenty years or longer it has seemed to me that the daw is
an increasing species in Britain; at all events I am quite sure that it
is so in the southern half of England, particularly along the coast of
Somerset, Devon, Dorset, and in Cornwall, more than in any other county.
And why is it? He is certainly not a respectable bird, like the
starling, for example--if we do not go to the cherry-grower for the
starling's character. He is and always has been on the keeper's and
farmer's black list, and scarcely a week passes but you will find him
described in some gamekeeper's or farmer's journal as "even worse than
the rook." Even the ornithologists who are interested in birds as birds
haven't a good word to say of the daw. According to them he alone is
responsible for the disappearance of his distinguished relation, the
chough. (The vulgar daw is of course devoid of any distinction at all,
unless it be his grey pate and wicked little grey eyes.)

The ornithologists were wrong about the chough, just as they had been
wrong about the goldfinch, during the late years of the nineteenth
century, and as they were wrong about the swallows and martins in later
years. Of the goldfinch, they said, and solemnly put it down in their
books, that owing to improved methods of agriculture the thistle had
been extirpated and the bird, deprived of his natural food, had forsaken
this country. But no sooner did our County Councils begin to avail
themselves of the powers given them by the Bird Act of twenty years ago
to protect the goldfinch from the bird-catcher, than it began to
increase again and is still increasing, year by year, all over the country.

Of the decrease of swallows and martins, they said it resulted from the
action of the sparrows in ousting them from their nests and
nesting-sites. But we know the true cause of the decline of these two
species, the best loved and best protected of all birds in Britain, not
even excepting robin redbreast. The French Government, in response to
representations on this matter from our Foreign Office, have caused
enquiries to be made and have found that our swallows are being
destroyed wholesale in France during the autumn migration, and have
promised to put a stop to this deplorable business. They do not appear
to have done so, since the promise was made three years ago, and I can
say from my own observation in the south and west countries that the
decline has continued and that we have never had so few swallows come to
us as in the present summer of 1916.

The daw--to return to that subject--has always been regarded as an
injurious species, and down to a quarter of a century ago every farm lad
in possession of a gun shot it in the interests of the henwife, even as
he had formerly shot the kite, a common British species and a familiar
feature in the landscape down to the early years of last century.
Doubtless it was a great thing to bring down this great bird "that soars
sublime" and nail it to the barn-door. By the middle of the last century
it had become a rarity, and the ensuing rush for specimens and eggs for
private collectors quickly brought about its virtual extinction. The
kite is but one of several species--six of them hawks--extirpated within
the last forty years. Why, then, does the daw, more injurious to the
game-preserver and henwife than any one of these lost hawks, continue to
flourish and increase in numbers? It is, I imagine, because of the
growth of a sentiment which favours its preservation. But it is not the
same as that which has served to preserve the rook and made it so
common. That is a sentiment confined to the landowning class--to those
who inherit great houses where the ancient rookery with its crowd of
big, black, contentious birds caw-cawing on the windy elms, has come to
be an essential part of the establishment, like the gardens and park and
stables and home-farm and, one might add, the church and village. This
sentiment differs, too, from the heron-sentiment, which serves to keep
that bird with us in spite of the annual wail, rising occasionally in
South Devon to a howl, of human trout-fishers. It is a traditional
feeling coming down from the far past in England--from the time of
William the Conqueror to that of William of Orange and the decay of
falconry. That a species without any sentiment to favour it and without
special protection by law may increase is to be seen in the case of the
starling. This increase has come about automatically after we had
destroyed the starling's natural enemies and then ceased to persecute it
ourselves. Of all birds it was the most preyed on by certain raptorial
species, especially by the sparrowhawk, which is now becoming so rare,
assisted by the hobby (rarer still) and the merlin. It was more exposed
than other birds to these enemies owing to its gregarious and feeding
habits in grasslands and the open country, also to its slower flight.
The greatest drain on the species, came, however, from man. The starling
was a favourite bird for shooting-matches up till about thirty years
ago, and was taken annually in large numbers by the bird-catchers for
the purpose. It is probable that this use of the bird for sport caused
people to eat it, and so common did the habit become that at the end of
summer, or before the end, shooting starlings for the pot was practised
everywhere. Old men in the country have told me that forty or fifty
years ago it was common to hear people on the farms say that of all
birds the starling was the best to eat.

When starling and sparrow shooting-matches declined, the starling went
out of favour as a table-bird, and from that time thyspecies has been
increasing. At present the rate of increase grows from year to year, and
during the last decade the birds have colonized every portion of the
north of Scotland and the islands, where the starling had previously
been a rare visitor--a bird unknown to the people. Here in West Cornwall
where I am writing this chapter the starling was only a winter visitor
until recently. Eight years ago I could only find two pairs breeding in
the villages--about twenty-five in number--in which I looked for them;
in the summer of 1915 I found them breeding in every town and village I
visited. At present, June, 1916, there are six pairs in the village I am
staying at. It may be the case, and from conversations I have had with
farmers about the bird I am inclined to believe it is so, that a strong
feeling in favour of the starling (in the pastoral districts) is growing
up at the present time, a feeling which in the end is more powerful to
protect than any law; but such a feeling has not become general as yet,
and consequently has had nothing to do with the extraordinary increase
of the bird.

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