…but welcomed!

This little visitor arrived in my yard and I had never seen it before. I let it know that it could come over any time if it just promised to take home the unwelcome rats that enjoy my yard, too. I hope this pretty black and white creature understood my request…

Speaking of black creatures, on Monday morning the crows were making a constant high pitched cawing noise with no stop in their intensity. I went outside to see what was up and there was a murder of crows and it looked like they were trying to commit murder on one of their own. I got a broom from the garage and walked out to the fence where one of the crows had gotten one of it’s wings stuck in the chain link. I talked nicely and took the broom and gently pushed the wing out from the link. It immediately flew away and the rest of the crows all took off and haven’t returned yet. I hope they have me on their favorites list now and go cawing somewhere else…

I looked up murder of crows and came up with some interesting information. This is pretty gruesome so you might want to stop reading here but I think this was exactly what was happening in my backyard Monday morning…

“…I do know, however, that the behaviour of ganging up on one crow (which does not necessarily have to be the weakest) is real. In Swedish, it’s called “kråkriksdag”, roughly translated as “crow parliament”. I’ve seen it happen, and it is a brutal event. There is some general squaking, but there is no clear target. Suddenly it starts and all of them jump on one crow, picking at it until it is dead, literally tearing it to pieces. They are so focused on this that you have to run straight in among them to scatter them.”

I guess I really did save the life of this crow that was stuck and defenseless.