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While at Flushing Meadows Corona Park near my house in Queens this evening putting my new lens through its paces,* I was entertained by the strafing runs that the Red-winged Blackbirds were taking at every Fish Crow that flew by. The Red-winged Blackbirds are just protecting their eggs and young from a known nest predator [...]

This story comes from Emily Johnson, who is a sub-permittee for a licensed wildlife rehabilitator in Helena, Montana. Emily lives in Big Sky, three hours southwest of Helena, which shows you the distance you have to travel out there to find a rehabber (I was going to say “which shows you how spaced-out rehabbers are,” [...]

This is one diabolical Hooded Crow!  If you are a person who is averse to seeing cats get the short end of the stick you might not want to watch. Hat-tips to Julie and Dawn.

One of the birds that birders visiting the Pacific Northwest most want to see is, of course, the Northwestern Crow, otherwise known as Corvus caurinus.  Slightly smaller on average than its American Crow kin, with a voice that David Sibley describes as “slightly lower-pitched and hoarser” though he also points out that the “American Crow [...]

My dad says he can call a Fish Crow from an American Crow on sight.  I’m not entirely inclined to disbelieve him, but I’ve always had trouble differentiating the two common, often equally so, Corvids of the Southeast.  There are more than a few places in the world where two species of Crows can be [...]

Crows, no matter the exact species being talked about, are typically recognized as being among the most intelligent of birds.  Crows are crafty, keen, clever.  They are trickster gods and crop-plundering pests, harbingers of war and users of tools.  Crows fascinate people because of their plumage, their behavior, their play.  Almost everywhere in the world [...]

When I first saw the post on the New York State listserv about the Hooded Crow on Staten Island I wasn’t going to twitch it.  Why?  It had to be an escaped bird or at least one that didn’t make it to the southernmost borough in New York City under its own power but by [...]

When it comes to crows, the term “murder” is usually used to describe a flock of these cunning corvids. For the first time, however, I found myself moved to use this word in its more traditional sense when I saw an American Crow taken by a larger avian predator… The bird astride this ex-crow is [...]

Rarely can an author crack my list of favorites with just a single work but somehow, Lyanda Lynn Haupt did. More than 3 years ago, I reviewed her fabulous narrative of Charles Darwin’s explorations of the Americas, Pilgrim on the Great Bird Continent. I’ve thought often of that book since then, savoring the memory of [...]

While I was in Cape May this past weekend I came across a trio of Fish Crows, two of which quickly took off and flew a short distance away from me.  The third held its ground and proceeded to pick through sticks, bark, and other objects on the ground, seemingly trying to decide if any [...]

On Saturday as part of a good half-day’s birding I explored Jamaica Bay hoping to find some birds that have come in with the warm weather that I could count for my Anti-Global Warming Big Year. I didn’t find too much that I haven’t already seen this year, in fact, a Little Blue Heron was [...]

The family of birds known as corvids is well known for what is kindly referred to as character. Put bluntly, these birds, which include crows, ravens, magpies, and jays, can be real jerks. They harass others with their raucous cries. They loot bird feeders and, even worse, bird’s nests. Bullies and thieves pure and simple, [...]