Imagine a devoted parent able to speak to his or her child, communicating in perfect speech patterns, often even in several dialects, regarding the dangers and misfortunes that await them as they grow into adults. And imagine the parent being able to pass on the
information as to what these dangers might actually look like.

Then imagine these very parents not looking anything like you. Rather,
imagine them as crows.

Humans have a long history with crows, fearing them as symbols of death.
This ill-begotten belief has been fueled by the crow’s scary nature – which
usually is defined by their dark appearance and baffling intelligence.
Take note of a much-reported experiment held by researchers at the
University of Washington.

But first, think of a time when you gazed at a group of crows. Is there any
way you could tell them apart the next time you saw them? As David Dietle
wrote in a report he penned about crows: “Every last one of them very likely
remembers you as the weird human who kept staring at them.”

The UW experiment entailed the researchers capturing seven crows on the
grounds of the campus, banding them, letting them go. They did this wearing
creepy skin masks, according to them “because it was funny.” They were
testing whether crows could recognize them.

They did.

When the researchers strolled around the campus with the masks on, the
crows would “scold” and dive-bomb them. And the crows didn’t just recognize
them, they passed the information to other crows who had never been
captured. These other birds started dive-bombing the scientists as well.

Further, the crows weren’t just telling the others to get the guys with the
masks. When other humans donned the masks they left them alone.
How did they know?

Simple: they were told.

And it didn’t stop there. Ensuing generations of these crows were able to pick
out the capturing culprits and displayed the same antagonistic behavior
toward them.

Dietle went on to write: “Crows have been known to change their entire
migration pattern to avoid farms where even a single crow has been killed in
the past ... Sure, they’re only avoiding those houses for now ... but there’s just
something deeply unsettling about the possibility that there are millions of
crows out there right now that know your address.”

A Murder of Crows
There are many versions of how a group of crows became known as a
“murder.”

One old yarn has it that crows will hold a meeting to determine capital
punishment against a wayward crow.

Another is that crows were an omen of death, associated with dead bodies,
battlefields and cemeteries.

The most likely reason, however, dates back to the times when collective
nouns were applied for more poetic reasons, such as a pride of lions, an
ostentation of peacocks or a parliament of owls.

Social Characteristics
Crows mate for life. They have tight-knit families. They are respectful of other
crows’ “territories” but will often roost in large numbers to protect each other
from predators such as hawks, owls and raccoons.

They are found all over the world except in Antarctica.

They are scavengers and will eat almost anything. They are expert thieves
and will steal food and anything else they can get their beaks around.

A Local Tale
Mountain resident Mike Nelson enjoyed a long-term relationship with our local
crows.

Nelson would often be met by two crows that would hang around the pro shop
at the Resort. They would spot him when he drove into the parking lot and
they would follow him around the pro shop grounds. He always had peanuts in
the shell at the ready.

“When I played Pinecone – the nine-hole course closest to the pro shop – they
would follow me to the first green, never farther,” Nelson told The Mountain
Times. “That next hole belonged to another family of crows, and one male
would walk with me on that hole and first half of hole No. 3, less than three
feet away from me which is strange because they are the most wary of birds.”
But that’s not Nelson’s most interesting golf-crow story. There was a crow on
Nos. 7 and 8 that would meet up with him.

“He and I go back six or seven years,” Nelson said. “He would not come down
while I was teeing off (editor’s note: Anyone who’s seen Mike drive suggests

even a crow would know better), but as soon as I started walking to my drive,
down he would come, hopping along with me.

“I’d throw him a nut and he’d crack it while I continued along the fairway. By
then other crows would arrive, but I always tried to give my buddy the first
nut.

“He would then fly directly over my head and actually bump me on top of my
head with his breast. Then he would glide down to the grass about six feet
ahead of me and look up, assuming he would get the next nut – which he
always did. He didn’t nudge me every time, just when a lot of competitors
were around.

“Interesting birds.”