Crows in love

By Verne Nelson

Yesterday I saw two crows perform the mating ritual. As I discovered later on the Internet, apparently this is rarely observed because it is only done at bond formation and the bond lasts for life.

It happened in a parking lot. I was sitting on a bench in view of it when I heard odd but crow-like sounds. Can’t remember the sound, however when I looked I saw the male standing over a half-crust of bread. He looked directly at the female, calling her plaintively, and then prostrated his body to the ground over the bread with wings fanned beautifully in a full, flat, iridescent spread.

The female approached with a kind of dance, bowing and partially spreading her feathers while vocalizing. When they were finally face-to-face they clipped (without menace) at each others beaks like two scissors. Then the male rose and mounted the female while she crouched and twisted her bottom around to allow mating. As with most birds, that was over in a second. Then the female flew off silently to a high, bare-branched tree and perched.

The male followed soon after, also in silence, and perched nearby on a separate branch. The bread was abandoned. After about 20 seconds they both flew off together, again in silence. They may have been near their nest.

And me, without a camera, but otherwise — WOW!

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Verne Nelson is a former statistician in the field of epidemiology, now retired for nine years. His avocation is bird photography and observing nature in urban areas and wildlife preserves. This post is reprinted with Verne’s permission from the East Bay Birding Yahoo Group.