AS THE CROW FLIES

AS THE CROW FLIES

by Karl MacKeeman 

Crows and ravens have been living in a relationship with human-kind from the dawn of time. Genetic research has shown that they followed the nomadic hunting tribes across the landbridge that stradleded the Bering Strait. They exsisted always at our fringe because where-ever humans would go they would be bifting rubbish. Crows would feast on the remains of hunting and fishing camps. The crow genic material can be traced all the way down the Pacific Coast of North America towards Central America. They are one of the few birds with as wide a range of distribution. Some variations exsist but for the most part a crow is a crow.

I watched them around my campsite with John and Graham in Baja, California, Mexico. We were camped in a catus forrest where as far as the eye could see there was nothing but catus, some higher than houses and as old as eight hundred years. We camped in a formation of caves formed by hugh rocks. In a clearing was a cerial tree of about thirty feet and a favorite perch of a few local crows.


Where-ever human beings went there was war. Crows blackened the skys throughout Europe and Africa where battles raged they fed on the carron. If you read about the wars in early Japan in the age of the Shogun and the Samari you read how the eyes of the dead were plucked out by crows. Crows were inteligent enough to know that the human race was self-distructive and would always provide a means of subsistance to the black birds. It was perhaps for this reason crows were associated with death and did not gain much respect in human eyes as did thier close relative, the Raven. Artic cultures also respected the raven. In Confederation Centre you can see a inuit whalebone carving of a raven.

The Vikings decorated thier longships with the image of the raven. West coast tribes elvated the raven to a god-like status. In fact they were instrumental in the creation of humans in the stories of the Hidia. They were carved into totem images and lodge and canoe decoration. Ravens are highly intelligent birds but not as sociable as crows .In Charlottetown one family nests near the Provincial archives. Edgar Allen Poe made ravens famous in his poem of the same name and it was even given some tribute in a film with Vincent Price. The Simpsons on television perhaps presented the most well-known version.

Crows have slipped into our language in many ways. Some people are said to have crow's feet around their eyes. In Scotland, to "go down the crow road" is to die and there's the saying "one crow, sorrow..." A favorite drawing tool I used in my youth was called a "crow quill" . It was a very sharp steel pen and tube-shaped at the nib. In Australia I heard the expression, "stone a crow". When I was a kid , we had target gun sets called "Crow Shooting" and sometimes we heard of people who "had to eat crow". "As the crow flys" was a common saying when in 1948, John Huston made the academy award wining film "TREASURE OF SERRIA MADRE".
Fred C. Dobbs made the best answer to that when he said, "Yeah, but we ain't crows." That's true enough.

Crows have been roosting in Victoria Park since it has been one of the last stands of trees left that havn't been turned into a golf course, patatoe field or a shopping mall. A war of wits has been going on to confuse and misdirect our black friends but the last time I looked up at the sky in the evening I could well see that they are back. They have not always been appreciated by people. In the National Park in Cape Breton they have learned how to remove rubber windshield wipper blades from the parked cars of torrists. Crows think that they make ideal nesting material. In Japan they steal steel wire clothshangers for the same perpose. The hangers are the same thickness as the tree branches they used to use The Electric company there has to hire a team of workers to remove the wire nests from electrical towers.

Crows are one of the few birds that have a recorded language. E.T. Seaton recorded a vocabulary of crow language nearly a century ago. Anyone who feeds crows on a regular basics will reconize some of the simple words for "cat" or "all clear". If you spend enough time with crows you learn a lot about thier family behavior. One old guy flew into my hand this summer. I've been feeding him and his family for years and he had medical problem with his feet that were all twisted and deformed. He was easy to reconize because of the one white feather in his left wing. I couldn't help but feel it was a farewell visit.


"Pegleg" was an old friend from Spring Park Road. I learned about cache from him. He would hide food I gave him and then call the others to join him once he tucked away something for himself. This is a custom also shared by bluejays which are close cousins to crows. oil 20"x16"
"Crow In Winter" 20"x16" oil on canvas.

 KDM

DOWN THE CROW ROAD

by Karl MacKeeman on Friday, May 6, 2011 at 12:49pm

Ravens are a little less socialable than crows and live in smaller groups. In Charlottetown they nest close to the archives in the centre of the city.I've been sketching and painting crows for many years now but of course they are not a popular subject. Had I choose pretty song-birds that would have paid for paint and canvas, but crows, even though are not pretty are song-birds. In fact they are considered amongest the largest songbirds. Many people wouldn't find the songs of of crows to be pretty. In fact I've known people that have shot crows just for the crime of disturbing thier Sunday morning hangover.It sure isn't pretty what they do to the sidewalks on Brighton Road and there has been considerable expense used to discourage the roosting in Victoria Park. Crows are a world-wide problem because they have one the widest distribution of any bird. Some cities have whole departments devoted to what they call "the crow problem".
Cultures as differant as the west coast first nations tribes of North America and the ancient Greeks have considered crows and ravens 'god-like'. Apollo, the sun god, had a white raven as his messanger and confident until the bird brought him news of the infidelity of the human woman he was dating at the time. In his anger Apollo killed his lover and later regretted it. A case of blaming the messenger, He turned the raven black to mourn her and banished him from Mount Olylimpis.
The Hidea believed that the human race was created by raven along with the moon and the stars. People who lived closer to nature than we do today were well aware of the intelligence of all members of the crow family.
Where-ever people went crows have followed.They have adapted well to civilization. Our wars provided food for flocks of crows and ravens. Our gibbets and garbage dumps did the same. Members of the crow family can eat almost anything and much of my failed cooking experiments have gone to the crows without complaint. The only thing I've seen rejected is carrots.
Ernest Thompson Seaton was amongest the first writers to record and write about the language of crows and observed, sketched and wrote about his observations of crows in the Don Valley. These birds are amongest the most intellegent creatures on earth. Crows are one the few animals that can make and use tools. Few animals can do that. Dogs have trained people to pick up thier poop in little brown plastic bags but were're not sure if that's a sign of thier inteligence or ours. They not only learn new behavour but pass it on to others in the flock. In Cape Breton, in a national park the learned that rubber windshield wipers on automobiles make excellant nesting material. Removing rubber windshield wipers from parked cars has been a problem for park officials there. In Japan crows adapted wire coathangers as nesting material. Stories of crows adapting to survive in a urban inviroment abound.
Some good reading material on crows have come to print.
"Crows: Encounters With the Wise Guys" by Candace Savage, Greystone Books, Toronto, 2005
"In the Company of Crows and Ravens" by John M. Marzluff and written and illustrated by Tony Angel, Yale University Press, 2005
"The Way of the Crow: Black Spirit" by Laurie Lacey, Nimbus Pub., Halifax 1996.
This last book is small but packed with some great crow stories.

KDM

PAINTINGS OF CROWS

A CONVERSATION IN HALIFAX

 This bronze statue sits atop a public building in Halifax near the waterfront. This is a 20" x 16" oil on canvas, framed $400.00 Crows have been classified as amongest the larger songbirds. People are surprised to find out that they are in fact songbirds. They're voices are not pretty but they do have a language that is universal and amongest the flock they have regional words. The warning word for cat or preditor is the same everywhere. The food call is the same everywhere and the young stay with the parants often well over a year and still call for thier mom and dad to feed them. I observed a crow and it's behaviour while camping in Mexico.
Crows behave in a similar way in the desert as they do in Victoria Park.  In Charlottetown the city fathers have spared no expense in trying to discourage the crows from roosting in the Brighton aera. Crows endure and have returned to roost dispite the efforts made to discourage them. They are an unstopable bird.

"STOP"
is an oil on canvas 16" x 20" framed $400.00  I painted this after seeing a crow perched on a stop sign being sassey. Crows are not shy. They are very territorial and I have seen them gang up on a stranger in the neighborhood. The family clan stays together sometimes for three or four years. The oldest bird in the clan I fed, became crippled so that he could not use his landing gear. He would land on my hand so I could feed him. His clan continued to come at a feeding time to my backdoor on Goodwill Avenue. There was more than three generations in my yard. Once I even observed one of the perched on the head of a fake owl on the roof of the nieghbors' house. Fake owls don't worry crows. I could spot old "Whitey" by the white feathers on his wing.
 When I lived on Spring Park Road, I fed a crow I named "Pegleg". He could walk on only one leg because the other was damaged and out of use. He was always the first to be fed but would cache his grub under a leaf pile or elsewhere and then would call the flock to feed after stashing some lunch for later.
KDM