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Help with identifying a Crow/ Rook please? (1 Viewer)

AlanR

AlanR

Bird photographer
United Kingdom
I am having real trouble with these two. Every time I spot what I think is a Crow, it turns out on closer inspection to be a Rook.
I took these from about 3 metres and I am still not sure.
Could it be a juvenile Rook?
[Taken this morning at Cotswold Water Park in Gloucestershire, between a lake and some trees.]
Alan
 
Picus-viridis said:
I am having real trouble with these two. Every time I spot what I think is a Crow, it turns out on closer inspection to be a Rook.
I took these from about 3 metres and I am still not sure.
Could it be a juvenile Rook?
[Taken this morning at Cotswold Water Park in Gloucestershire, between a lake and some trees.]
Alan
Click to expand...
Hope this finally attaches some files!
 
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keithyed said:
also a handy thing i was once told if 1 then its a crow , if several then probably rooks
Click to expand...
That's dangerous! I've seen groups of scores of Crows... (and I live in an area where Rook is rather local in appearance, so I tend to be on the lookout for them).
 
Unfortunately two of our commonest birds present a serious ID challenge, and are much more difficult than people suppose as you have spotted by suggestign juvenile Rook. A Rook does not get its distinctive pale bill base until Feb to May of 2nd calendar year, and until then is very hard to tell from a crow, but what you have here is, nonetheless, a crow. See how curved the upper mandible is? A young Rook has a straighter and more pointed bill. It really is that subtle and I think many birders don't trouble to learn them apart as they are both common. I Shame really, and good on you for tackling a tough one early on. Good practice for the challenges to come. And don't think that anyone except the most experienced finds this easy. For my part I've been trying to practice crows and rooks and see the differences in jizz in distant and flying birds and I just can't.

Graham
 
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That's dangerous! I've seen groups of scores of Crows... (and I live in an area where Rook is rather local in appearance, so I tend to be on the lookout for them).



hehe ya but does work most times i also find can get closer to rooks where if a crow sees you its off
keith
 
bitterntwisted said:
Unfortunately two of our commonest birds present a serious ID challenge, and are much more difficult than people suppose as you have spotted by suggestign juvenile Rook. A Rook does not get its distinctive pale bill base until Feb to May of 2nd calendar year, and until then is very hard to tell from a crow, but what you have here is, nonetheless, a crow. See how curved the upper mandible is? A young Rook has a straighter and more pointed bill. It really is that subtle and I think many birders don't trouble to learn them apart as they are both common. I Shame really, and good on you for tackling a tough one early on. Good practice for the challenges to come. And don't think that anyone except the most experienced finds this easy. For my part I've been trying to practice crows and rooks and see the differences in jizz in distant and flying birds and I just can't.

Graham
Click to expand...
I am trying to go on the shape of the tail in flight - but you don't always get to see that!
Alan
 
Rook has rather longer narrower wings in comparison as well as the diffrence in tail shape. It flaps considerably faster than Carrion Crow too.
 
keithyed said:
sorry original thread has gone

look at face of rook
http://www.birdforum.net/pp_gallery.../cat/all/page/1
and then a crow
http://www.birdforum.net/pp_gallery.../cat/all/page/3

if you can see any white/grey at the base of the bill its a rook

also a handy thing i was once told if 1 then its a crow , if several then probably rooks

keith
Click to expand...
Keith.
I came back to pick up these pictures again for my favourites and the links seem to have decayed with time.
Can you identify them again, please?
Alan
 
Jane Turner said:
Rook has rather longer narrower wings in comparison as well as the diffrence in tail shape. It flaps considerably faster than Carrion Crow too.
Click to expand...
I'd say this feature, along with call are the best to go on. I spent a while trying to look at Crows and Rooks tail shapes, but I could never get my head around it! Wing shape is alot easier to make out.

Everyone know the old saying: A Rook on its own is a Crow, and a Crow with some more is a Rook!!! Saying that, I saw a flock of 120 Crows today!!!!! This is only really safe if the flock is whirling around a big tree with loads of nests in it....that's a Rookery, Crows nest on their own.
 
If you're looking at detail like bill curvature, then you could also take into account the Crow's more rounded skull and truly black plumage - a Rook will have a peaky skull and irridescent purple plumage in good light.

I can't tell them apart in flight, though.
 
Thanks for the info - I'm glad I'm not the only one who has trouble with crow vs rook. Another worry I have on seeing a supposed crow with black bill is whether the thing is simply sillhouetted, and is in fact a rook with a white bill base. I have been caught that way more than once. I do try and look for bill shape as well, but the difference looks very subtle to me.
 
Picus-viridis said:
Keith.
I came back to pick up these pictures again for my favourites and the links seem to have decayed with time.
Can you identify them again, please?
Alan
Click to expand...


just go into Gallery and search for both you should get several good pictures

keith
 
We used to have enormous trouble up here with these two in the North and West of Scotland - that was until some bright spark went round and painted purple/grey sashes on the crows!!!! ;)
We still get the 'black' ones popping up to keep me guessing, though.
 
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