As members of the corvid family, crows are considered to be among the most adaptable and intelligent birds in the world.
Crows are generally black, with black beaks and legs, but they can also be black with white, gray, or brown coloring.
Crows have a varied and evolved language. They can mimic the sounds made by other animals, and they learn to associate noises with events, especially with the distribution of food.
Well-adapted to diverse habitats, crows are found across North America. They thrive in cities and suburban areas where they live in close association with humans.
Crows roost at night in large flocks of
up to several thousand during the winter. During the day, smaller groups
may fly up to fifty miles in pursuit of food.
Crows are omnivorous. They eat whatever is available
to them in their habitat including insects, small amphibians and
snakes, earthworms, eggs and nestling birds, and clams, mussels, and
other salt-water invertebrates. They also scavenge carrion, garbage, and
eat wild and cultivated fruit and vegetables.
With a preference for coniferous trees,
crows build their nests in woods or isolated trees at least sixty feet
above ground. Nests are solidly built of branches and twigs, and are
lined with bark, plant fibers, mosses, twine, and other found materials.
Crows nests are bulky structures built in trees or bushes. They are made of twigs, lined with bark, grasses, and rootlets.
Paired male and female crows share in the
incubation of four to six eggs which hatch in eighteen days. Young
first fly when they are about one month old. Frequently, at least one
young bird will remain with its parents through the next nesting season
to assist in the care of new nestlings by bringing them food and
guarding the nest.
The female crow lays 4-7 eggs in the nest,
and the male helps incubate them. These eggs are greenish or bluish,
and blotched with brown. Once hatched, the young remain in the nest 6 – 8
weeks, and in their early life they eat almost half of their weight per
day in food, which the parents bring to them.
They are migratory, and will assemble in large flocks in the fall, to travel south.
They eat a number of pests which are
harmful to those same crops, including cutworms, wireworms, grasshoppers
and even noxious weeds.
