Wildlife Photographic Journals

Flying Corvids

I started a new lunch hour project a couple of weeks back to try and get some flight photos of the jackdaws and rooks that lurk around the farm field next to my office car park. The lunch hour session is very therapeutic as for a brief period in the middle of the day I can forget the stresses of the office, immerse myself in some wildlife, and start the afternoon refreshed. It took a couple of days to start getting the photos I was after but I soon began to get some results.

The first photo of a magpie is actually from another site but keeps with the general theme of the crow family in flight.

I have always had a fondness for jackdaws but must confess it was the rooks which were the target species of this mini project. The autumn foilage in the distance providing some warm backgrounds colours.

Finally I come on to my target species, the rook. This is a bird that generally seems to be ignored as dull and uninteresting. In fact I asked a few people around the office what colour they thought rooks where and the usual answer was 'well its just a boring black bird'. So I have converted a few photos to black and white as this seems to be how most people view them.

So if this is how you see rooks then I urge you to take a closer look next time you see some because they are subtly very colourful birds with a rich blue and purple metallic sheen to their feather in the sunlight. Hopefully after re-examination you will then start to see them for the beautiful birds they really are.