Syracuse.com - Grim reality: It's sometimes a crow- eat-other-bird world out there

[HuntingNY-News]

Earlier this week, I saw an eye-opening scenario unfold on the street in front of my house.

Wendy Worsham's "Fat Crow" painting. Worsham's paintings are acrylic on either canvas, wood or paper. She often combines colored pencil, ink and oil. Submitted photo 

There's some hard realities in the world of birds this time of year - particularly involving crows.

Earlier this week, I saw an eye-opening scenario unfold on the street in front of my house. There was a big crow on the road, holding down a small, live, struggling bird with its feet. It was pecking repeatedly at it to kill it.

At the same time, there was a swarm of at least a half dozen other small birds, continuing swooping down on the crow. Within a couple of minutes, the small bird being held by the crow was dead and the crow picked it up in its beak and flew away.

Laura Erickson, former science editor at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology and author of several books on birds, said the crow's actions were not a case of a bird acting badly. Most likely, she said, the adult crow was getting food to feed its young.

"Baby crows need a high protein diet," she said. "Crows are family birds that bond with each of their babies. They have to feed their babies. They're hunters. People eat other mammals, and some birds eat birds of other species.

It's really no different than one of us going to the store to buy meat and milk for our children," she said.

Crows often get their needed food this time of year, she added, by raiding the nests of robins, red-winged blackbirds and a host of other small birds -- often waiting until the young birds are nearly ready to fledge (leave the nest) before grabbing them. The one on my street could have either been plucked out its nest and dropped on the road, or could have been hit by a passing car and was disabled, Erickson said.

The reaction of the other birds to the scene was not usual, she said. Often, when a crow grabs a young bird or is causing some other kind of trouble, smaller birds of various species will react to the stress call of one and join in on what Erickson called "mobbing" behavior. This can result in repeatedly dive-bombing of the crow or working together to chase it off.

Erickson stressed crows aren't the only birds that target the young of others, mentioning blue jays, great horned owls, red-tailed hawks and even bald eagles, among others.

"Even chipmunks raid the nests of birds," she said. "There's so much exciting drama out there this time of year if people are paying attention."

View the full article on The Syracuse Outdoors Blog