Hi all, The local discussion of crows reminded me of something I'd observed in early December while at a rural conference center in Deerfield, MA. During the last hour of the morning session--not that i wasn't totally focused, of course!--the background noise grew louder and louder with calls of crows. Right after lunch I walked about 1/3 mile down the road towards an extensive woods divided by a power-line right of way. There were uncountable crows, but behaving as I'd never seen during the evening roosting phenomenon we get here in downtown Ithaca. The crows I observed were thinly spread over a great distance--I couldn't tell how far along the power-line cut in both directions. There were one or two birds per tree, high in the leafless branches, calling constantly and very restless: playing a kind of "musical branches" as one bird would take off, fly not very far, setting off another individual into a short flight, etc.
I stayed a half hour in one spot and the activity and noise did not decrease, nor was there a discernible direction or pattern to the movement. Fascinating--as crows usually are. One person suggested it had to do with deer hunting season. We did hear distant shots --but regular, as if on a timer device designed to....scare crows? But then we got back to our conference business. Nancy Nancy Gabriel n...@cornell.edu<mailto:n...@cornell.edu> 109 Sears St, Ithaca NY 14850 607 277 8930 -- Cayugabirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsWELCOME http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsRULES http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsSubscribeConfigurationLeave.htm ARCHIVES: 1) http://www.mail-archive.com/cayugabirds-l@cornell.edu/maillist.html 2) http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/Cayugabirds 3) http://birdingonthe.net/mailinglists/CAYU.html Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --
