When I first met Bo, he lived outside my apartment complex in the territory of Lod and Girlybird, where he helped to raise his kid brother, Junior. Now that he is an adult crow, he has found a mate and moved out. Luckily, his new territory is only two blocks away. We try to visit him every day. Sometimes twice.
Bo on the left, the beautiful Lorena on the right.
When Bo and Lorena first established their territory, they had claim to an area about the size of convenience store. Not enough for two crows that are planning a family. Bo and Lorena were constantly fighting with other crows over food (and over me) when I came around, and because I didn’t want my presence to incite violence, I had to limit the time I spent with them. A couple months later and Bo has expanded his territory to almost two city blocks, which is very impressive for a new couple. Many of the crow families in my neighborhood only have about a block to call their own. Older couples have more, I believe. For example, the territory of Lod and Girlybird spans at least two and a half blocks, from what I’ve observed. Right now territory boundaries are a big deal. With mama crows nesting and babies hatching, the food demand is high, and territories are fiercely guarded. The fights can get brutal. This past Monday I took a crow to the Portland Wildlife Rescue for a large puncture wound under a possibly broken wing, which I believe was the result of a turf war.
From what I understand, however, once the babies learn to fly, the families are more lax about defending turf and actually intermingle. I’ve also read that the extended family will come and visit hatchlings much the way people visit newborns to ooh and ahh over them. Crows are very social and have strong family bonds that extend beyond the mated pair to their parents and siblings and probably aunts, uncles, and cousins.
Lorena has been sitting on the eggs for a few weeks, now, and I’ve seen very little of her. When I saw her this week, she looked pretty beat.
All the puddles and rain gutters from the last storm had dried up, and the weather was getting warm again. I wasn’t sure if Bo and Lorena had any nearby water sources, so I brought over a plastic salad container and filled it with water. Bo came down and watched me with interest. Crows are tentative to approach things that aren’t familiar to them, so to make him more comfortable, I dropped some of his snacks (a couple kibbles and some peanuts) into the water.
To my delight, Lorena also came down and partook in the water.
She let me get pretty close. She also stayed down for a long time. I wondered if this was because it was so warm out that the eggs could stand to be left alone for longer.
(In all of these shots, Bo is on the left and Lorena is on the right)
After Lorena got her fill of food and water, she went back to the nest. The nest is really high up in a pine tree, and hard to see from the ground (as it should be). I took some pictures, but had to go full and grainy zoom on my decade-old Canon Powershot, so none of them came out particularly impressive. Only a couple shots came out that were worth sharing, but they aren’t going to win any photo contests.
This is a view from below:
And this is a view from the street:
We hung around with Bo for a while longer. Watched him chase off a few crows here and there and drink more water.
Through watching crows, I’ve learned that when crows give something the side-eye, they’re assessing a situation or figuring out what they’re looking at.
When they look at something straight on, they are focused, with an intent to act or direct a vocalization.
And then they act.
After bobbing for peanuts, Bo foraged for a bit, and we followed him around. It’s very meditative, watching him side eye the grass and then snatch up a worm, grub, or beetle. And fascinating, if you’re a bird enthusiast. Bo doesn’t mind me following him. In fact, I think he enjoys teaching me about crow life. He loved teaching Junior. He’s gonna be a great dad.
I tried to get some footage of him foraging, but my efforts to capture anything shareworthy failed. I did get a cute clip of him running eagerly across a driveway to the next lawn, though. I think crows like to run when they get the opportunity. I’ve seen Bo run all the way across a street toward me when he could have made it in half the time by flying.
Bo’s foraging efforts were rewarded greatly when we came across an abandoned package of microwaveable burritos. I don’t know how they got there. My guess is they fell out of someone’s grocery bag. I can promise this wasn’t staged, as I would never intentionally feed Bo this level of junk, especially not in such a large quantity.
In observing crows faced with a challenge, I’ve seen them stand on top of whatever it is that they’re trying to assess. I’m not sure why they do this. Maybe it helps them to literally get a feel for what they are working with. It also reminds me of how I myself will put my hand on something when I’m trying to figure out what to do with it. I’ve seen crows set one foot on food I’ve given them while they contemplate whether to eat it or cache it.
Bo was super stoked about this find. He was primarily interested in the tortillas. He cached a lot of them in the trees nearby.
I don’t know if Bo credits me for the burritos, but he was really happy with this visit. Fresh water, good food, and friendship. When he was all done caching tortillas he stood on my head for a long time.
Maybe when he stands on me he is contemplating my inner workings the way he was contemplating the bag of burritos. Or maybe this is his hug. Whatever it is, it’s fantastic.
The next day we went to visit and freshen up their water. It looked like they had made good use of it, soaking food, and perhaps bathing in it.
I had just finished running an errand so I showed up in my car. Bo likes climbing all over my car and perching on the luggage rack.
I’d been doing the math the night before. It's been about three weeks that Lorena’s been on the nest. It occurred to me that she was probably spending more time on the ground the day before because the eggs had hatched! So I plied Bo with a ton of snacks in the hopes that he would go up to the nest. And he did. And then I heard the chicks making their scratchy peeps. And I cried.
I don’t have any friends with firetrucks or cherrypicker lifts. I doubt anyone who lives nearby would take kindly to some woman knocking on their door asking if they could entertain her dog while she climbs onto their roof to get a picture of a nest. None of the climbable trees in the area are tall enough to offer a good vantage point, plus I don’t think I’m a very good tree climber. So I stood in the middle of the road with my camera and my dog and recorded what I could. The zoom was at full capacity, which didn’t give the image stabilizer much to work with. If you are prone to motion sickness, keep a bucket close by as you watch this blurry, wiggly movie of Lorena on the nest, tending to her young (sorry, can’t see the chicks yet) and possibly eating the eggshells. ...I wonder if David Attenborough would be interested in narrating for me?
Bo and I celebrated his fatherhood with some coconut whipped cream. He loves sweets. I’ve seen him suck on gummy candies and slurp melted ice cream off the ground.
I wanted to give some to Lorena, but she didn’t come down. We’ll have to celebrate another day with peanuts.
CONGRATULATIONS, BO AND LORENA!!!
In closing, I want to give a shout out to this little guy. Pilot is an amazing dog. So gentle with the crows, so patient with me as I drag him around the neighborhood in snowstorms and heat waves and hail and downpours while I feed and photograph crows. He’s a great kid. Perhaps the greatest.
I hope you’ve enjoyed this post! If you’d like to learn more about my friendship with Bo, please read my blog An Unexpected Friendship.
I am passionate about crows and post obsessively about all that I learn from them. If you are interested in learning along with me, please do follow me!
Thanks for reading!