Carrion crows... Your thoughts?

[nightshade]

I must admit to being fascinated by them

[Jonny]

Yep, I like crows too. Though I saw one this morning with a fully grown and very much alive Starling in its beak..!! There was a lot of comotion and a Magpie was getting involved too, diving in..
I was driving, so did not see the outcome..

[bobbarber]

Originally Posted by FUDGEY

I watched a crow today walk along the top of a hedge and every few seconds it paused and stuck it's head in. Half way along it came out with a young song thrush about 10 days old and flew away with it. I went back later in the day to find an empty nest. It's incredible the number of nests I check that I know should have young that are empty. I don't have grey squirrels or magpies in my area so I'm sure that crows are responsible for the majority of these nests being empty. I know it's nature, but this does annoy me. Crows are at an all time high in my region and maybe there numbers are just too high. I'll probably get lambasted for this, but it's just the way I feel. Am I going over the top?

Taking the great tit as an example, clutch size usually in the 6-11 range. If we take an average of say 8, and half were males and half were females and reached breeding status, the population could double each year with out predation and could possibly be treated as a pest specie like the house sparrow was years ago. Nature is not `All things bright and beautiful ` but `Red in tooth and claw`...bob

[lincs lass]

Personally I'd shoot it. I have no objection to magpie cages either especially as magpies attack the pheasant chicks, or baby blue tits just leaving the nest by grabbing them and biting the heads off. Normally I wouldn't interfere, but occasionally there is a good enough reason..........I know what I prefer to see in my garden and it ain't crows or magpies.

[Amoeba]

Originally Posted by lincs lass

Personally I'd shoot it. I have no objection to magpie cages either especially as magpies attack the pheasant chicks, or baby blue tits just leaving the nest by grabbing them and biting the heads off. Normally I wouldn't interfere, but occasionally there is a good enough reason..........I know what I prefer to see in my garden and it ain't crows or magpies.

Predators keep the numbers of small songbirds in check, as bobbarber put across. If there were no predators the songbirds would over-populate and out-eat their resources.

Sounds like you have a bit of a bias for the cute and small, despite the fact crows and magpies have just as much a right to survive how they can. If that involves prey animals, so be it. Don't forget, blue tits do a lot of killing too. It's just their prey is not commonly considered aesthetically pleasing.

[aeshna5]

Originally Posted by Amoeba

Predators keep the numbers of small songbirds in check, as bobbarber put across. If there were no predators the songbirds would over-populate and out-eat their resources.

Sounds like you have a bit of a bias for the cute and small, despite the fact crows and magpies have just as much a right to survive how they can. If that involves prey animals, so be it. Don't forget, blue tits do a lot of killing too. It's just their prey is not commonly considered aesthetically pleasing.

The voice of common sense over partisan sentimentality!

[buzfuz8149]

I have been through the protect eveything stage and I am now at an age when I see mankind as a busy body trying to rule Mother Nature.
Rest assured she can sort all things if left to her rules, I just wish she could get on with it.

The Crows are doing what we would do to if we had to.

[poohbear]

When I was a kid in north Notts...there were next to no magpies...Then along came modern man with his roads and huge increase in motor vehicles...I've never seen this mentioned elsewhere..but modern roads are the equivalent of McDonalds to members of the crow family.
Every 100 yards is a corpse of a rat,rabbit or hedgehog.This feast over the last 50 years has been a huge bonus to these birds.When I was a kid you never saw these birds in the cities...now there are thousands of them.

[aeshna5]

Originally Posted by poohbear

When I was a kid in north Notts...there were next to no magpies...Then along came modern man with his roads and huge increase in motor vehicles...I've never seen this mentioned elsewhere..but modern roads are the equivalent of McDonalds to members of the crow family.
Every 100 yards is a corpse of a rat,rabbit or hedgehog.This feast over the last 50 years has been a huge bonus to these birds.When I was a kid you never saw these birds in the cities...now there are thousands of them.

The carnage caused by vehicles has certainly been beneficial to corvids. You possibly also saw few Magpies when you were younger as numbers may have been artificially suppressed by gamekeepers which are now fewer in number.

[FUDGEY]

Mmmm interesting posts. What about the rspb and the likes interfering with nature then? I think sometimes it needs to be done.