ELNikkor wrote:
Thanks for the info., I'll look for the roost if it is nearby and often used, or if I see them in those numbers again. I also used to feed my crows canned cat food, Bill. Once, I took Edgar (Alan Crow) to high school and kept him in my locker. When I fed him at lunch time, I didn't have a spoon, so I fed him the cat food with my finger, then went directly to English class. Soon, the whole class was disturbed by the smell, so the teacher couldn't teach. I meekly confessed to having cat food on my finger. Of course, she needed an explanation, (go figure!), and soon she had me go fetch the crow and do a mini-lesson on raising a pet crow. Elevated my popularity after that...
Thanks for the info., I'll look for the roost if i... (
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I named mine Quote. If they ever learned to talk I didn't want them to talk with a lithp.
Prior to 1918 was about the time the conservation of migratory birds was a joke to most. Market gunning was taking a toll. Even robins and blackbirds went to New York markets. Passenger Pigeon and Bison lessons were forgotten. Women needed the feathers from egrets shot at the breeding grounds(leaving untold thousands of chicks to starve)or they were behind in their fashion duties.
The sad part about the crow was, as a maligned pest, the laws were and still are loosely applied. You want stink, hinting at killing feral cats to reduce their predation of songbirds will put you at odds with every ailurophile out there.
And I am a believer in hunting. I enjoyed it. I ate what I killed. Maybe that's why I didn't see sense in killing crows.
Bill
ELNikkor wrote:
Thanks for the info., I'll look for the roost if it is nearby and often used, or if I see them in those numbers again. I also used to feed my crows canned cat food, Bill. Once, I took Edgar (Alan Crow) to high school and kept him in my locker. When I fed him at lunch time, I didn't have a spoon, so I fed him the cat food with my finger, then went directly to English class. Soon, the whole class was disturbed by the smell, so the teacher couldn't teach. I meekly confessed to having cat food on my finger. Of course, she needed an explanation, (go figure!), and soon she had me go fetch the crow and do a mini-lesson on raising a pet crow. Elevated my popularity after that...
Thanks for the info., I'll look for the roost if i... (
show quote)
It was English class, she should have read you some Poe. I mean you had already made Edgar an honorary Raven.
Here in Sacramento I watch them going west to east every morning, then back east to west in the late afternoon. I don't watch them every morning.
Every morning they make their transit. Sometimes I watch them.
I would guess on some afternoons there might be 500 to 1000 crows. Sometimes they stop in our neighborhood and cluster in the high plane trees. It's a fascinating phenomenon I've been watching for many years.
I heard there's a major cold front going thru the Rochester area. Maybe they're moving away from the cold weather.
"serial murder of crows"......"Now that's funny! I don't care who you are!"
billnikon
Loc: Pennsylvania/Ohio/Florida/Maui/Oregon/Vermont
ELNikkor wrote:
I usually see only 7-10 crows at a time, but this morning, as I watched the birds come to our feeders, I noticed hundreds of crows flying low over the trees for 45 minutes, from east to west, spread out for at least 10 miles from first to last. It was the coldest morning of the year, (about 3 degrees F), a slight wind and particle snow from the west. Where did they come from? Where were they going? We live 10 miles west of Rochester, NY, near some woods. Anyone else ever notice a phenomenon like this in the dead of winter?
I usually see only 7-10 crows at a time, but this ... (
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You experienced a Murder didn't you. Crows are very communicative, they can travel great distances for a meal.
GED
Loc: North central Pa
In Lancaster Pa and King of Prussia several years back large flocks of crows tore the roof material off of some of the shopping malls causing much expensive damage. All kinds of deterrents including explosive charges were used to try and chase them away. Hunting them turned out to be the most effective deterrent.
They are incredibly intelligent birds. I raised two when I was younger and they both learned to talk, they lived free and would come to me when I called, one of them would grab my neighbors practice golf balls and put them in the rain gutter. They were a lot of fun until the police shot them claiming they could have rabies.
Of course crows don't get rabies, but at that time I believe they were more intelligent than the police.
There are crows in my community. I usually see 3 to 4 crows searching for food in the mornings. They can scavenge for food as well as Sea Gulls can. I've never seen the behavior you stated. But, I can truly tell you, that by observing them for at least 10 years now. They are one of the most intelligent birds on this planet.
dlay
Loc: Maynardville, tn
I had a pet crow when I was young, named him Ellsworth, just recently found out that he would fly through the windows of a small elementary school about two miles away and take pencils off the desks. He was one smart bird, he was free, what got him killed about three miles from home.
DirtFarmer wrote:
Wouldn't that be a serial murder of crows?
No, just a good day of shooting.
Dennis
Corvus, (my first crow) loved pencils too. He'd peck them to pieces. I still have one of the decimated pencils he chopped up in 1963...
ELNikkor wrote:
Corvus, (my first crow) loved pencils too. He'd peck them to pieces. I still have one of the decimated pencils he chopped up in 1963...
Interesting, the love affair that crows have for pencils.
Crows are federal,y protected under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, but there are get-around for agricultural pests (and other damages). However, big crow roosts are largely a wintertime phenomenon and thus no crops are reall at risk, and thus they should not be shot. In the East, Common and Fish Crows can be inthe same flocks or roosts, but for the most part they segregate. Where I live in piedmont Virginia, we have both species in summer, but the Fish Crows mostly move to waterfront areas or dumps for better food resources.
ELNikkor wrote:
I usually see only 7-10 crows at a time, but this morning, as I watched the birds come to our feeders, I noticed hundreds of crows flying low over the trees for 45 minutes, from east to west, spread out for at least 10 miles from first to last. It was the coldest morning of the year, (about 3 degrees F), a slight wind and particle snow from the west. Where did they come from? Where were they going? We live 10 miles west of Rochester, NY, near some woods. Anyone else ever notice a phenomenon like this in the dead of winter?
I usually see only 7-10 crows at a time, but this ... (
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There was (is?) a huge crow roost in central Kansas in a catalpa forest near the tiny town of Medora, a few miles from where I was raised. Not proud of it now, but as kids we would go to the center of the roost just before the crows started coming in. The noise was deafening at the peak. We would point our 12 gauge shotguns in the air, no need to aim, and shoot. Several birds would fall. Again, not proud of it, I also remember trying to shoot crows with 22 shorts. If they were very far away, the bullets just bounced off. Tough birds, and very smart also. I stopped hunting shortly after that.
htbrown
Loc: San Francisco Bay Area
When I was in Junior High, I walked by an orchard going to and from school. At certain times of year (surprisingly, not when the nuts were ripened), the orchard would be mobbed by crows, the trees black with them. When a kid (me) walked by, they'd make a variety of clickings and croakings that all sounded ominous to a thirteen-year-old imagination.
My crow would sit in a tree for hours making every noise he could think of, except "caw caw". He could imitate the voices of the neighboring ducks, chickens, geese, collie, even a peacock. He would only say, "Hello", however, when the phone would ring.
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