Corvid Roost.

Please bear with me as I once again recall something that has intrigued me for many years. Going back I guess fifty plus years when my Father farmed between Challow Station and Sparsholt a wood known as Fox Covert was in the direct flightline of what must have been a winter roost of Rooks,Jackdaw and Carrion Crows these Corvids would pass over the wood for about an hour pre-darkness and must have numbered many thousands. My brother and I would stand with twelve bores at the ready to lessen the numbers of what at that time we regarded as agricultural pests with an almost total lack of success due either to the birds ability to twist and turn at the right moment but more likely due to rubbish marksmanship or possibily a lack of desire to want to destroy the lives of these birds as they battled high winds, snowstorms and anything else the English weather could throw at them as they fought so hard to survive after a day spent in the fields eking out a borderline existence. I often speculated where they roosted thinking the woods below Kingston Lisle or the woods just east of Whitehorse Hill as a possibility, I noticed just last winter the flightline still in operation and I must make the effort to finally satisfy my curiosity and find the roost this next winter, it should be fun - if time allows that is.

camboy                                                 Winter Corvids