Tag Archives: Corvids

As The Crow Flies

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Family can show up in different species, too.

My crow family (I refer to them as my cousins) are getting ready for spring by building nests in the backyard trees in preparation for the next gen. They return to the same location every year.

Did you know that crows are among the smartest animals in the world? Their intelligence is similar to that of chimpanzees. A crow’s brain accounts for almost two percent of its body mass, similar to that of humans.

I talk to them all the time and it seems as if they accept me and don’t even blink an eye when we’re together in the garden, and have brought me many shiny gifts throughout the years.

This crow cousin was gathering twigs and grasses for her nest. If you look closely, you’ll see she likes pine needles, too.

Nest construction begins in early March and will continue through about June. It takes one to two weeks to finish a nest after which the female will lay a clutch of two to six eggs.

Crow nests are made mostly of pencil-width twigs. A new nest is usually about 1.5 feet across and 8-10 inches deep.  After the bulk of construction is complete, they’ll line the cup of the nest with soft materials like grass, tree bark, moss, flowers, paper, or fur. 

Both partners participate in nest construction. Helpers might aid to some degree but most of the work is left to the parents. https://corvidresearch.blog/

I help too, and gave them the fringe I cut off a pillow that I planned to recover in a different fabric.

It’s raining today, unexpectedly, because all that was forecasted was some light drizzle, and now everything is wet. I hope my crow cousin’s nest is somewhere warm and dry. I’m going to look for more nesting material they might like to use because it makes me happy to think I’m kinda sorta like THEIR family, too.

(All photo credit to Enchanted Seashells.)

Gifts From Above

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My crow cousins have been leaving gifts for me all around the garden and deck.

Shiny and sparkly!

So far I’ve discovered these four baubles. I always look up to see if I can catch the gift giver; so far I haven’t, but I say thank you out loud as I pocket my treasures.

Crows are known to give small gifts to people who pay attention to them or feed them. The phenomenon is actually called “gifting”. I don’t feed my local crow family as there is plenty to eat without my intervention, but I do talk to them and generally love their presence, so maybe they feel that emotion and return the affection. I’ve read that crows (and other corvids) remember the faces of those who are mean to them and those who are especially kind.

Some of my neighbors don’t appreciate our community of crows as much as I do, and I’m positive they aren’t receiving the same kinds of gifts like I am.

I’m full of gratitude to my bird family Thank you, cousins!

Check out another crow post:
https://enchantedseashells.com/2023/01/25/crows-crows-and-more-crows/

Crows, Crows, and MORE Crows!

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Kids really do listen to everything we say, that’s absolutely true.

One time I looked up as a crow flew by and said, “Hello, cousin!”

Angel Girl asked me why I said that, and I told her that crows are very smart and that I feel they’re like family to me.

The next time we saw crows fly by, she pointed and said, “There goes one of your cousins, Grandma!”

Mom asked her why she said that, and Angel Girl told her all the crows in the whole world are Grandma’s cousins, which is a great thing to her because she loves her own cousins.

The best part of the story is that it makes perfect sense to her that animals are family. I like that a lot.

Besides a murder of crows, there are other collective nouns for crows: a horde, a hover, a mob, a parcel, a parliament, and a storytelling.

As for a storytelling of crows? This is a bit of an unknown but crows do tend to gather in large flocks and are known for their loud ‘caw’.  Perhaps someone observed this and decided that they weren’t so much plotting a murder but were telling stories to each other, https://www.birdspot.co.uk/

This photo from late yesterday afternoon must tell quite the story; I’ve never seen so many crows on the school field.

Seeing crows at sundown is a common occurrence around here, but not on this grand scale. Everyone driving by slowed down to gawk and neighbors came out to record it like I did.

On the roof, on the fence, on the fields — all my cousins!

View post on imgur.com

Update: I sent the photo to my original Angel Boy and received a video text from his almost seven-year-old clone, AB 2.0 — “Hey Grandma, that’s a lot of cousins!”

My happiness grew exponentially.

Hungry?

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Just a hungry scrub jay hanging out on the deck. They LOVE raw peanuts. I still find a few empty shells hidden in the garden nine years later..

One of my favorite photos from September 2011.

First there was one, then another, and for a while, there were about four jays who hung out and let me hand feed them.

Did you know that scrub jays are very intelligent?

From Wiki: Recent research has suggested that western scrub jays, along with several other corvids, are among the most intelligent of animals. The brain-to-body mass ratio of adult scrub jays rivals that of chimpanzees and cetaceans, and is dwarfed only by that of humans. Scrub jays are also the only non-primate or non-dolphin shown to plan ahead for the future (known as metacognition), which was previously thought of as a uniquely human trait Other studies have shown that they can remember locations of over 200 food caches, as well as the food item in each cache and its rate of decay. To protect their caches from pilfering conspecifics, scrub jays will choose locations out of sight of their competitors, or re-cache caches once they are alone, suggesting that they can take into account the perspective of others. According to new research from the University of California @ Davis, scrub jays also summon others to screech over the body of a dead jay. The birds’ cacophonous “funerals” can last for up to half an hour.

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