Introducing Dilbert!

This is Dilbert Simmonds. Please join me in welcoming him to the family. As you can probably see he is a jackdaw, but he is a special one.

A month or so ago, the back garden was full of raucous noise and feathered action as the local populations of starlings and jackdaws brought their young here to feed, drink and bathe. The presence of the jackdaws was something new. In previous years they had rarely visited. I think our street does not favour them so much as the adjacent ones where the older roof and chimney stacks offer better nesting and roosting spaces.  Anyway, for a while, on warm and sunny days, jackdaws and their calls dominated the lawn and adjacent hedgerow. Then, after a couple of weeks, the adults all pretty much moved off, leaving behind the youngsters, distinguishable by their all-black head and generally gawky behaviour, and this must have included the odd youngster that we now call Dilbert.

More days passed and all the youngsters left too... that is all except one: Dilbert. He now lives here pretty much 24-7 and it has become clear that he is not quite like the others of his kind.

Jackdaws are a famously highly gregarious species living in small groups consisting of many adult pairs. It seems that Dilbert for some reason has been unable to successfully engage with the rest of the flock. He also seems to be maturing more slowly, only recently shedding his fluffy fledgling leggings, and there is something about his face that is a little different too. His beak looks a little misshapen and, and this might be the most important thing is terms of his failure to be allowed into Jackdaw society, he seems to be almost mute. He can make a gentle sneezing noise and seems to do this when we enter the garden (probably as a greeting) but he does not make the distinctive squeaky chyak-chyak that the others do.

I don’t know what happened to make him the way that he is. Maybe it is genetic, maybe he fell out of the nest and landed badly or had some other accident that left him in some way impaired.

He drinks very frequently from the water bowls in the garden, and he loves to bathe – most days several times. He also lets me get very close. That’s not necessarily a good thing in a wild animal but we will make sure he has ample food and water and perhaps when he is fully mature, he will be able to integrate into Jackdaw society.

The western jackdaw (Coloeus monedula) is also known as the Eurasian jackdaw and like most other members of the crow family has a distinctive black plumage, but with a silver hood when mature. They also have piercing blue/silver eyes. It is common across Europe and also found in adjacent areas of Asia and Africa.