We've Got The County Covered
We've Got The County Covered
A stop at a suburban Seattle parking lot reminded me of the large number of crows in the Pacific Northwest. In the parking lot I could hear the familiar “caws” of foraging crows. Ten years ago, when my wife and I lived in Arlington, Washington (north of Seattle) every morning from my desk I could look out our second story window and see a small flock (called a “murder of crows”) working their way along the street, picking up bits of dropped food, forcing their way in to garbage bins set out for pickup and scavenging for things to eat. Just blocks away, living up to their reputation as clever problem solvers, I watched crows perched along the edges of a bank building drop nuts on to the roadway to the bank’s drive thru window, then swoop down to eat the contents of the nuts squashed by the cars.
When we lived in the Seattle area I read a couple of books about crows co-authored by University of Washington professor John Marzluff. Recognized as an expert on crows’ behavior he has since been studying, among several topics, crows’ ability to distinguish and recall differences among human faces. About ten years ago another incident presented itself in the area, involving the Bothell branch of the University of Washington, where thousands of crows began to return nightly to roost in a nearby protected nature area. Here’s some of what I learned about recent studies and behaviors involving crows in the Northwest.
Crows can recognize human faces
During the last ten years several graduate students under the direction of UW’s John Marzluff, have completed advanced degrees and are now doing their own research or working jointly with Dr. Marzluff. A long- term study has looked at the ability of crows to distinguish and remember human faces. Volunteers were outfitted with face masks that totally covered their heads and faces and then moved around the UW campus. Some of these masked volunteers caught and banded crows, apparently a traumatic experience for the crows.
A few days later the volunteers walked about the campus, some wearing the “dangerous” masks and others wearing “non-threatening” masks. The tagged crows would recognize the dangerous masks and scold and even do diving attacks to the humans wearing those masks. In similar experiments done ten years later it was found crows would still scold and attack the people wearing the dangerous masks. This led Marzluff to believe that not only did the banded crows recognize the threat of dangerous masks but shared their experiences so that future generations were warned of the potential danger.
Another common situation for crows is to gather around a dead crow. The onlookers appear to study the dead bird. Folklore suggests crows are morbid and that they are conducting “funerals” for dead colleagues. Marzluff’s theory is the crows, who are known to figure out problems and change behavior based on what they observe or learn, are studying the dead birds to learn what kinds of behavior or situations to avoid to remain safe. Crows definitely learn from observing what behavior works and what doesn’t when trying to get food or to avoid danger.
University of Washington-Bothell is a branch campus near where we are staying in Woodinville. I came across a news story about “thousands of crows roosting on the Bothell campus.” The university branch has a website directing visitors how to access the campus to see the estimated 16,000 crows that return each night during the fall. This unusual gathering, one of the largest for crows documented in the country, started about 10 years ago when the campus went through a serious upgrade and the trees in a nearby ‘wilderness area” reached a size they could accommodate several hundred nests that are “6-19 inches across and 4-15 inches deep.”
I took my wife, Sherry, and our two youngest grandsons over to the Bothell campus on a Friday evening to see the crows coming to roost. The campus is built on some rather steep hills. We asked a few students still on campus “where to find the crows?” They would point down the hill and say, “Go to the football field.” We arrived about a half hour before sunset (though it was already cloudy, big surprise out here) and saw a few random crows landing on the tops of some very tall fir trees at the top of the surrounding hills. Down in the woods where we assumed would be the nests, there was no activity we could detect.
After about a half hour we gave up and started the trek back up the hills to our car. That’s when we saw this classic shot (see photo with story) of hundreds, perhaps thousands, of crows perched on building roofs or on edges of surrounding structures. We later learned that they actually head for the nesting areas at dark, so we had left a bit early and missed that transition. Still, an impressive site to see them just waiting to head to bed. We learned crows have few natural enemies (mostly bigger hawks and eagles) but prefer to roost in large groups for protection, which explains why thousands would be drawn to one area to roost.
A couple of closing thoughts
Douglas Wacker is an associate professor in the college of School of Science, Technology, Engineering & Mathematics (STEM) at the UW-Bothell campus. He’s using his interests in how social interactions affect change in animal behavior. His students are working with crows that roost in the 58-acre floodplain and woods adjacent to the campus to learn how crows combine vocal and non-vocal behaviors to communicate in social groups. More about how the clever and resourceful crows live and learn is constantly being learned.
And finally, crows, as well as some magpies and many other birds, are protected by the Migratory Bird Treaty Act. Per the “Code of Federal Regulations”: “Except in the State of Hawaii, where no crows shall be taken, States may by statute or regulation prescribe a hunting season for crows.” While many states have seasons for hunting crows (including Washington) Montana does not. According to the Montana Fish, Game and Parks Department while crows cannot be legally hunted there are provisions for a special federal permit to deal with crows that are destroying crops or property or causing health issues. That permit comes through the Region 6 U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service office located in Denver.
