{"id":82025,"date":"2020-02-20T05:06:25","date_gmt":"2020-02-20T12:06:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.featheredphotography.com\/blog\/?p=82025"},"modified":"2020-02-20T06:47:12","modified_gmt":"2020-02-20T13:47:12","slug":"a-crows-revenge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/2020\/02\/20\/a-crows-revenge\/","title":{"rendered":"A Crow’s Revenge?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Or perhaps it was a combination of revenge, anger and frustration. Or something else but I doubt it was simply play.<\/p>\n

First some background.<\/p>\n

In August of 2014 Utah in it’s infinite wisdom approved an annual crow hunt, despite the fact that virtually no one eats crows so their carcasses are simply left in the field to rot. In order to somehow \u201cvalidate\u201d the hunt DWR conveniently classified the American Crow as an “upland game bird” (gimme a break!). Utah code specifically prohibits the “waste” of any upland game but the Wildlife Board approved the crow hunt anyway.<\/p>\n

I attended and spoke at the meeting of the Utah Wildlife Board where that decision was made and it was an unmitigated farce. If I’ve ever attended a meeting with a hidden pre-set agenda that was it. I’ve ranted about the meeting and this unfortunate decision in a previous post so I won’t do it again here but if you’re interested in more details about that ridiculous meeting and the hunt here’s the link to that post<\/a><\/span> (scroll down to the end of the photos for the discussion).<\/p>\n

Which brings me to yesterday morning at Farmington Bay WMA where I had an experience with an American Crow that still has me wondering about the cognitive abilities of the entire group of corvids, crows included.<\/p>\n

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1\/1600, f\/6.3, ISO 800, Canon 7D Mark II, Canon EF 500mm f\/4L IS II USM + EF 1.4 III Extender, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\n

As I approached the crow on the ice and saw something red below “him” I assumed he was feeding on something bloody but when I got my lens on him it became instantly obvious that it was a spent shotgun shell (waterfowl hunting season closed a few weeks ago).<\/p>\n

The crow was in a highly agitated state as he continually called out to his nearby companions with the spent shell at his feet.<\/p>\n

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1\/2500, f\/6.3, ISO 800, Canon 7D Mark II, Canon EF 500mm f\/4L IS II USM + EF 1.4 III Extender, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\n

Twice he picked it up and turned toward some of the other nearby crows before dropping it again.<\/p>\n

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1\/4000, f\/6.3, ISO 800, Canon 7D Mark II, Canon EF 500mm f\/4L IS II USM + EF 1.4 III Extender, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\n

At one point he even set the shell on its end vertically at his feet and then resumed calling out excitedly.<\/p>\n

While he was calling he was almost constantly flashing his nictitating membrane. Some corvids, Black-billed Magpies for example, are known to flash their whitish-blue membranes as a means of communicating with others of their own species so I have to wonder if that’s what this bird was doing. I suspect it was.<\/p>\n

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1\/3200, f\/6.3, ISO 800, Canon 7D Mark II, Canon EF 500mm f\/4L IS II USM + EF 1.4 III Extender, not baited, set up or called in<\/p>\n

This last time he picked up the shell he was on a mission.<\/p>\n

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1\/4000, f\/6.3, ISO 800, Canon 7D Mark II, Canon EF 500mm f\/4L IS II USM + EF 1.4 III Extender, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\n

He turned his back to me (naturally, they always do…) and took off to the west with the shell still in his beak.<\/p>\n

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1\/6400, f\/6.3, ISO 800, Canon 7D Mark II, Canon EF 500mm f\/4L IS II USM + EF 1.4 III Extender, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\n

By the time I regained focus on him he was about 70′ in the air and far away so this photo has been heavily cropped. He flew directly over a small but very thick patch of phragmites and dropped the shell into the middle of it. I missed the shots of the falling shell because I lost focus at exactly the worst time but I clearly saw it falling and where it landed.<\/p>\n

Who knows what was really<\/em> going on here. I certainly don’t but for me at least speculation is impossible to avoid.<\/p>\n

I’ve reported what I witnessed as accurately as I possibly could so I’ll leave readers to their own thoughts about motivation.<\/p>\n

Ron<\/p>\n

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Notes: <\/em><\/p>\n