downtown crows in trees

Magnifique,c'etait un grand rassemblement de corbeaux.

Glad you like it. I was fascinated. They stayed for a few weeks. They were so wonderful to drive through. But they were making a mess of the downtown blocks where they were gathering. So the city hired a hawk (yes, really!) to come hang out in the area and the crows split off to different parts of the city in smaller groups.

When I was young, in Faro on the front sea trees birds used to gather at sunset for the night. In Lisbon's Rossio the same, I remember as student go there just for the show.
Here in Monte Gordo the same happens, but in a much more modest proportion than in your really impressive film.

This happened in the winter for a couple years in a row. The second year the city hired a trained hawk to split the crows up and disperse them. The hawk didn't kill them!

But I was sad, because I loved them. At least they were handled humanely.

That’s really interesting, Raingirl ! Guten Morgen !

Glad you enjoyed it! I loved seeing them, and got to for many days in a row.

Get out of there now! Haven’t you seen The Birds?

Ha ha! I know!! And I have. But somehow these were very friendly seeming even in their large numbers. Maybe they were spread out enough to not scare me! I have been scared by crows in the past, and all because of that movie!!!!!

Don't leave the car parked to long, It can get messy !

Indeed! After a few weeks the city dispersed the birds with a hired hawk for that very reason (the hawk is trained not to kill the birds). They were having to do major cleanup of the sidewalks every day.

A great capture Laura do you know what they are ? Some years ago about this time of the year tens of thousands of starlings used to come into Leicester for the Winter it was said they came from Russia they made a terrible mess, fortunately they don't come now

They are crows. We are supposed to have ravens here as well, but I've never seen them in Portland. Starlings can be a handful. But we get a wonderful migration of Vaux's swifts that come through town. We used to live a block from the elementary school where the swifts stop over and sleep in the tall chimney. It is an amazing spectacle. These days thousands of people come to see about 16,000 swifts swirl around and eventually at sunset all disappear into the chiminey seemingly all at once. When my daughter went to that school, they couldn't turn on the furnace until the swifts had moved on their way to the next migration spot! Some years it was quite cold before they could warm the school. But a number of years ago the local audobon society raised funds to upgrade the school's heating system, so now the chimney is only there for the swifts. Here is a video showing them (Sadly I never took any when I lived there.)
You can find videos with explanations, but this one shows the birds in the air best. They are amazing. Check out around the middle of the video (it's only about 2:30 minutes long) where you can see the swirl dumping into the chimney:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=gHgEAIK8P18&t=40s&ab_channel=JuliaChapin

So many crows! =O

Around here we only have flocks of jackdaws like that.

Yes, a murder of crows. (That's the collective noun!)

There are a ton of different subspecies of crow. Ours are unsuprisingly called American Crows (Corvus brachyrhynchos). Ravens are also crows. You Jackdaws are also crows. Our name isn't very interesting... Ours is also almost half again as large as yours. Ours are protected by our Migratory Bird Act of 1918. You can't keep them as pets. Sometimes we have 15,000 in the downtown area. Uh oh, I'm going on and on. If you want to read more, our audobon society has a good page on them and our downtown. (Hazing is used to move crows a few blocks away into our wooded parks - still in downtown - and away from bus malls etc. Hmm, well you know me when I get going. Anyway, here's the audobon page: audubonportland.org/our-work/rehabilitate-wildlife/having-a-wildlife-problem/urban-crows/downtown-crows

"murder of crows" =,D

Yes, I am somewhat familiar with that expression. And can't think of anything similar in Finnish.

I absolutely love jackdaws especially because of their sound: youtu.be/VLcLLjFhPpU

They used to be so called "monastery town birds", because in old towns only churches and monasteries provided tall towers and places for them to build their nests. But after modern towns with other tall buildings, they started to spread around the country.

And because they are so social, they can for example make "mating trips" in flocks from town to town, and follow human made roads to navigate.

Moreover, just like teenagers used to drive cars around few blocks in city center, the jackdaws does the same. I have seen them flying in the dark, very low, even below the roof tops, and going around and around of few buildings only. Taking advantages of light provided by street lamps.

great video and sound. our crows have a harsher sound, but still similar. the video swarms remind me of swifts - but obviously the jackdaws are way bigger than swifts. do you think they are trying to make group decisions? ha!

The Birds / Alfred Hitchcock aus dem Jahr 1963***

Yup.

I only watched that movie once - scared me enough that I will never watch it again! But I still like our local crows. Go figure.

It reminded me of that as well. If you are interested in crow behavior, check out baynature.org/2020/10/29/flying-in-for-the-crow-funeral.

Fascinating! Thanks for the link.

A bird for our times.

They have a lot of negative associations, but I find them beautiful and fascinating. They are so smart!

Jawohl und in Neukaledonien gibt es besonders kluge Krähen:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Caledonian_crow

I'd love to find a way to fix my camera on my bike...