The Silence of the Crows Part 1

Here is your mission, if you choose to accept it. When you are outside, start paying attention to what you DON’T hear. If you have a lot of crows in your area, have you noticed you aren’t being as deafened by the caw-cawing going on? Or if you do hear them, is it mob rule, or is it just one, lone bird cawing?

Here on the Cape, nesting season is just beginning. And for this generally loquacious group of birds, they suddenly go silent. Stealthily silent, maybe because they are afraid other birds will “do unto them as they have done unto others” a.k.a. nest robbing, they go about like CIA undercover agents. Slipping from tree to tree without a word, acting totally innocent if you happen to see them. I saw a crow just a moment ago with nesting material, which he dropped when he saw me. Could have just been accidental, but then I saw three others, with leaves, and sticks in their beak, and they winged away without a sound.

The one, lone bird cawing, is what I noticed as I walked the bog this morning. Usually this 5-acre bog is watched over by two families of crows. And generally, they are diving at each other, feeding on the bog etc. But for the last two days, just one crow on one side of the bog and another on the far side, is all I saw. Sentinel birds, watching and giving warning when Tuck and I make our appearance, but no mob joins them to hurl invectives at us.

The crow group that you watch through the year is generally made up of the breeding pair which I believe they stay attached through most of their lives, and along with them, are several generation of their offspring. The family that caws together stays together. And it is probably one of the reasons they are so successful. More crows to stand guard, more crows to help build the nest, more crows to bring tidbits to this years prodigies. Seems to be working for them doesn’t it, for who are some of the most prolific birds around? Crows. Which is exactly why I decided to start paying attention to them. When I am out with school groups or adults, I can be sure I will see some, so why not have more to say about them then, “Say, there’s a crow!”

But I will spare you the “More to say about them” part. This is part 1 after all. I will be gone for a couple of weeks and when I return the nests will have been built and perhaps the lovely green and black speckled eggs laid. I will try, quixotically, to find their nests with my binoculars, but I would have better luck again, if I had a helicopter. Top of trees, but well hidden is where you would find them.

All right then, you have your marching orders. Listen for the silence of the crows and if you are so inclined, let me know what you see or don’t see, hear or don’t hear. For that matter, I just added my email to my profile, so if you want to add to the body of knowledge, perhaps it will be easier now. What are crows doing in CO I wonder, in NM, in KS, in Nebraska, all the places you live and I do not. Remember “Each one- Teach one.”