(_Corvus Aamericanus_) Crow family
_Called also_: CORN THIEF
(Illustrations facing pp. 16 and 28)
_Length_--16 to 17.50 inches.
_Male_--Glossy black with violet reflections. Wings appear
saw-toothed when spread, and almost equal the tail in length.
_Female_--Like male, except that the black is less brilliant.
_Range_--Throughout North America, from Hudson Bay to the Gulf
of Mexico.
_Migrations_--March. October. Summer and winter resident.
If we have an eye for the picturesque, we place a certain value upon
the broad, strong dash of color in the landscape, given by a flock of
crows flapping their course above a corn-field, against an October
sky; but the practical eye of the farmer looks only for his gun in
such a case. To him the crow is an unmitigated nuisance, all the more
maddening because it is clever enough to circumvent every means
devised for its ruin. Nothing escapes its rapacity; fear is unknown to
it. It migrates in broad daylight, chooses the most conspicuous
perches, and yet its assurance is amply justified in its steadily
increasing numbers.
In the very early spring, note well the friendly way in which the crow
follows the plow, ingratiating itself by eating the larvA|, field mice,
and worms upturned in the furrows, for this is its one serviceable act
throughout the year. When the first brood of chickens is hatched, its
serious depredations begin. Not only the farmer's young fledglings,
ducks, turkeys, and chicks, are snatched up and devoured, but the
nests of song birds are made desolate, eggs being crushed and eaten on
the spot, when there are no birds to carry off to the rickety, coarse
nest in the high tree top in the woods. The fish crow, however, is the
much greater enemy of the birds. Like the common crows, this, their
smaller cousin, likes to congregate in winter along the seacoast to
feed upon shell-fish and other sea-food that the tide brings to its
feet.
Samuels claims to have seen a pair of crows visit an orchard and
destroy the young in two robins' nests in half an hour. He calculates
that two crows kill, in one day alone, young birds that in the course
of the season would have eaten a hundred thousand insects. When, in
addition to these atrocities, we remember the crow's depredations in
the corn-field, it is small wonder that among the first laws enacted
in New York State was one offering a reward for its head. But the more
scientific agriculturists now concede that the crow is the farmer's
true friend.