I'm spending a fair bit of time up on the highest, most northerly point of the Observatory recording area at the moment (hopefully more on this to come), and an otherwise fairly quiet session this morning was made much more interesting by this Jackdaw, which dropped in for a couple of minutes on the clifftop path and then left north soon after, thankfully giving me a close-up evil-eye fly-by. Lack of time restricts how much subspecific delving I can do at the minute, but I wanted to get the photos up now to encourage informed comment from those who are more familiar with them than I - specifically, is this within the range of variation for C.m.monedula (Nordic Jackdaw), or is it a potentially better fit for C.m.soemmerringii (Russian Jackdaw)? The standard reference (Offereins 2003 - see here), Martin's (and Alan's) Birding Frontiers musings (see here and here) and a scan of various others (though not extensive!) certainly provide various reasons to chin scratch.... more hopefully later. If anyone would like to comment, I'm at nazemark-at-yahoo.com or @Fileybirder.
(The above photo shows the initial distant views, and when taken with the other photos also illustrates the symmetrical collar/neck patterns from both sides)
