The Crows at Trenton Station

Originally uploaded by crowdive.

We were lucky on the morning of our departure. The crows from a nearby rookery were dispersing for the day and we saw thousands of them perching on powerlines and trees as they moved toward their destinations. In the winter crows gather in huge flocks to socialize and to benefit from the safety found in numbers. The owl is the predator that most torments the crow family and in these huge flocks the odds are against any one particular crow being eaten. Crows have held my attention since I saw my first small flock about 30 years ago. Crows in our area had been nearly exterminated by poisons used in agriculture so that when I was small there were no crows to be seen. When I was a young teenager I saw a flock of 5 crows and several years later I saw a flock of 11. From there the numbers increased each year so that now I see crows daily and occassionally am luck enough to learn the whereabouts of a roost where many thousands of crows sleep overnight during the winter and early spring. I'll have more to say about crows and ravens later...