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June 7, 2010 at 7:14 pm #595090
christopherboffoliParticipantDid anyone else see that cloud of about 40 (no exaggeration) crows chasing that young eagle across the Junction around noon today? What a racket too! I’ve certainly seen eagles being harassed by the odd pair of seagulls or crows. But I’ve never seen such a big, dark cloud of crows like that. I almost expected to see Suzanne Pleshette and bunch of school children running for their lives below them.
June 7, 2010 at 8:37 pm #695944
KenParticipantJune 7, 2010 at 8:49 pm #695945
anonymeParticipantDon’t know if it was the same bunch, but I saw a much smaller group of crows chasing a juvenile eagle in Arbor Heights this morning. I took a careful look at the eagle to make sure it wasn’t the raven that has been driving crows mad the last few weeks.
June 7, 2010 at 10:33 pm #695946
GoGoParticipantDidn’t see the murder, but did have a baby (or adolescent) crow outside our front door over the weekend. The dogs were very excited and so were the crow parents. Lots of barking and cawing back and forth, I was amazed the crows didn’t try to dive bomb the dogs.
June 8, 2010 at 1:14 am #695947
BuddyParticipantBe carefull, crows are vindictive- article from Boingboing, but I also heard it on an AM talk radio…kind of funny:
To test the birds’ recognition of faces separately from that of clothing, gait and other individual human characteristics, Dr. Marzluff and two students wore rubber masks. He designated a caveman mask as “dangerous” and, in a deliberate gesture of civic generosity, a Dick Cheney mask as “neutral.” Researchers in the dangerous mask then trapped and banded seven crows on the university’s campus in Seattle.
In the months that followed, the researchers and volunteers donned the masks on campus, this time walking prescribed routes and not bothering crows.
The crows had not forgotten. They scolded people in the dangerous mask significantly more than they did before they were trapped, even when the mask was disguised with a hat or worn upside down. The neutral mask provoked little reaction.
June 8, 2010 at 1:29 am #695948
ToddinWestwoodMemberA couple weeks back we watched the crows going after an eagle above Arbor Heights Elem. Must have been 20 plus crows. too dumbfounded to get out my camera.
June 8, 2010 at 2:12 am #695949
EmmyJaneParticipantI’m pretty sure that murder of crows was on its way to de-worm my yard. :-)
June 8, 2010 at 2:41 am #695950
christopherboffoliParticipantIt was interesting that, after the crows chased the eagle off towards Seacrest, minutes later they seemed to break off one by one and fly back to their respective territories, leaving others to continue the pursuit. It seemed as though they gathered in response to some kind of general alarm like Minutemen or something. Remarkable.
June 8, 2010 at 4:26 am #695951
inactiveMemberHey cjb –
Crows are cool. Problem solvers with a memory and a fascinating social structure.
Next winter, or late fall, trek on over to the intermural fields/IMA area around the UW. Get there about 1 1/2 hr. before it gets dark and at dusk you will see crows converge there in a rookery in excess of 12,000 birds. The Ornithology Lab at the UW and the WOS (Washington Ornithological Society) have studied these birds for years.
They know they commute from over 50 miles every night to that rookery. This isn’t the only large rookery in the area, but I observed it for years when I lived in Wedgwood.
You will see single crows during the day, but at dusk they gather each other in to small, increasingly larger flocks as they work their way across the city. It is an amazing sight to see when they arrive en masse at the Montlake cut.
And, hey – maybe bring your video camera and share the shots with us. :)
June 8, 2010 at 5:31 am #695952
dawsonctParticipantThat’s interesting you mentioned that WSD. Late one afternoon when I lived near Ravenna Park a few years ago, I heard a building racket while I was in my house. Came out to the yard to see EASILY multiple hundreds of crows in the trees in our neighborhood. They kept arriving for about 30-45 minutes, calling to each other the whole time. Really fascinating behavior while they were gathering. all of a sudden, without a perceptible change in the call pattern (but what do I know, I don’t speak corvid), they all took of to the S.E., towards Montlake. Now I know why. They only did this once in my neighborhood while I was at home; I felt rather fortunate to witness it.
June 8, 2010 at 5:56 am #695953
christopherboffoliParticipantI had heard a while back about what Buddy posted but it was actually a longer story. I guess initially the students who were catching crows for study made the mistake of not wearing masks. And after the crows were released they remembered the students and would dive bomb them whenever they saw them on campus. Apparently, even when the students would be away for summer break the crows would remember them in the fall. So subsequent researchers wore the masks.
I think it may have come from this TED lecture which also has details about a vending machine that crows learned to use:
I have to say though, I think I’d appreciate crows much more if they weren’t so damned loud and didn’t make a mess of my neighborhood my rummaging through garbage pails.
When it comes down to Team Crow or Team Eagle I have to admit that I’d throw my support behind the latter.
June 8, 2010 at 6:24 am #695954
inactiveMemberNice overview in the video. Thx for putting that up.
Eagles are amazing too, no doubt about it. They are both fascinating in their own right. Most birds, wild creatures in general actually, are endlessly compelling to me. Dumpster divers, or not. ;)
June 8, 2010 at 3:00 pm #695955
berthaParticipantIt’s fledge season for crows and the parents are super protective while the babies leave the nest and learn to fly. Check out this Seattle Times story that describes fledge season and the mask study http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2011999710_crows01m.html?syndication=rss.
Christopher, perhaps you should appreciate crows more and encourage your neighbors to do a better job securing their garbage can lids because really it’s the humans making a mess of the neighborhood by not taking care of their cans!
June 8, 2010 at 3:44 pm #695956
yeah-meParticipantI love crows. I had a pet crow for several years when I was a child (my father is an ornithologist and we had legal permission). It was hands-down the most interesting, smart, and funny pet. He followed me to the bus everyday and met me each afternoon. He followed me on my horse. He played in the bathtub when I took bathes. He hid shiney things in every plant in the house. One of his funnier traits was to walk under those old webbed lawn chairs and poke people in the bum.
They are extremely clever, social birds.
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