KEIJL GO (2011) Unusual nesting site and behaviour of western Jackdaws Corvus monedula. LIMOSA 84 (4): 162-164.

In the morning of 29 April 2011 a nest of Western Jackdaw was found under a roof of a railway station in Castricum, province of Noord-Holland, about 3 m above the station's platform. It was roughly circular, 50 cm in diameter and about 12 cm high, and consisted of branches of Elder Alnus, Lime Tilia and Poplar Populus. A pair was seen entering the nest at the moment of discovery, but during the next seven visits spread over six days no Jackdaws were observed near the nests. In the evening of 29 April three more, less advanced nests were present under the same roof as well as dozens to hundreds of twigs deposited between the nests, probably by the same Jackdaw pair. Six days later the nests were (illegally) removed by railway officials, because a little girl had supposedly been attacked by a Jackdaw. Photographs (not seen by the author) were said to show scratching in the girl's face. Attacks on humans by Jackdaws seem to be extremely rare: only a few cases have been reported in literature, involving bird ringers handling nestlings. In the occasion described here, there were definitely no chicks, most likely not even eggs yet.
Open-nesting is known to occur in Jackdaws, but is apparently rare anywhere in Europe. It is therefore argued that the nests were built by a single, inexperienced Jackdaw pair, possibly 'forced' to build in this location because of a scarcity of nesting holes, as Jackdaws are very common breeders in Castricum. Multi-nest building has not been described in Jackdaws.####Western Jackdaw Coloeus monedula

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