Very cool observation! Most likely that was a shrew not a mouse. Blarina brevicauda, the short-tailed shrew, largest shrew in New York, is the most likely creature to make tunnels under the snow to your bird feeder, and is also the most likely small mammal to be caught and killed by crows. I've probably seen 50 or more Blarina caught by crows to any other mammal species.
This brings up one of my fondest memories of my son's childhood; I'm sure he's been embarrassed enough already, but I haven't mentioned it to the list for a decade. I learned small mammals in college by their scientific names. There still is not an "official" list of standardized common names for much of anything except birds. So in Mammalogy, we learned only scientific names, and that's how I think of them. That large, common, silvery-gray shrew snuffling around just under the grass (or snow) in your yard is, and always will be to me, Blarina brevicauda. So, when my little son was sitting on my lap looking out at the snow and the bird feeders, he asked what the raised lines were in the snow below them. I said that they were the tunnels of Blarina, a shrew, that were coming to eat the birdseed on the ground. What he heard and internalized in his small child mind was "blah-RHINO." So he imagined little tiny rhinoceroses running around in tunnels under the snow. That image still makes me smile. Kevin From: bounce-5352959-3493...@list.cornell.edu [mailto:bounce-5352959-3493...@list.cornell.edu] On Behalf Of cfschm...@aol.com Sent: Thursday, February 25, 2010 12:58 PM To: CAYUGABIRDS-L@cornell.edu Subject: [cayugabirds-l] crow catches mouse! Just watched a Crow standing under our feeders in an odd, crouched position. Suddenly he jabbed into the snow, and brought up a mouse! After a quick kill, he made a good bloody mess on the snow pecking at it, and has now flown off with it. Also, a large flock of Robins are at our Buckthorn fruit. Carol Schmitt -- Cayugabirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsWELCOME http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsRULES ARCHIVES: 1) http://www.mail-archive.com/cayugabirds-l@cornell.edu/maillist.html 2) http://birdingonthe.net/mailinglists/CAYU.html 3) http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/Cayugabirds Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --
