*** Crows show strong group loyalty. Despite man's hunger to always expand taking more and more habitat. This bird has not only survived but thrived.
*** Crows incubate their eggs for 18 days. Within five weeks the baby crows are able to fly.
*** A crow can eat almost anything. Diet includes grains, insects, eggs, fruit, even carrion. Rarely do crows face a food shortage because they are so adaptable.
*** A crow gives up flock loyalty during nesting season. Attention is transferred to the female. Researchers believe that they mate for life and are model wildlife parents. A mate knows where the other is at all times. Even in flight, a slower mate is waited for so that the two can fly as a team.
*** During nesting the male provides the female with food. When the eggs hatch, the pair provides their offspring with a minimum of eight full meals every day.
*** Crows have very rapid digestive systems. This accounts for them being able to eat large quantities of food even when they are babies.
*** The raven and crow are two different birds. The raven is larger and remains in northern regions throughout severe winters.
*** A crow, like a parrot, can learn to repeat words and even long phrases. This indicates a high degree of intelligence. It can associate words with meaning. Also, the crow responds to commands.
*** The crow is a scavenger and hunts along the sides of roads.
*** Crows warn each other of danger.
*** Crows build large basket type nests of sticks, bark, fur, leaves, and whatever else they can find that attracts their attention. Yearlings often help.
*** Scarecrows are useless in discouraging crows from raiding the garden.
*** Researchers have succeeded in distinguishing some 300 different crow calls. Five different crow calls have been distinguished to refer to different kinds of danger.
*** Crows dislike hawks and owls and chase them when the opportunity arises.
*** The crow's ability to learn new behaviors in a changing environment is one of the reasons they are as common as they are.
*** Crows have forward pointing bristles which cover their nostrils. This aids in preventing bacteria from entering their bodies when they feed on carrion.
© Copyright North American Wildlife Health Care Center
P.O. Box 155
Black Mountain, North Carolina, USA 28711
A non-profit 501-3-C organization dedicated to wildlife research and education
Offering nesting materials to songbirds makes life easier for them
Birds can find nesting materials without our help, but having them readily available entices birds to nest in favorite backyards.
Place the nesting materials where birds can see them easily. Place nesting materials on shrubs, over a clothesline or in a suet basket and hang from a tree branch. Never place nesting materials in a nest box. Birds might think it was already occupied.
What to offer birds?
String that is no longer than 4"
Yarn that is no longer than 4"
Small rope no longer than 4"
Soft cloth pieces
Upholstery stuffing
Scraps of fur
Recently shed or combed pet hair
Cotton
Sphagnum moss
Clean Poultry feathers
Dried grasses
Healthy human hair
Pieces of wool
Soft bristles from old paint brushes
Do not offer terry cloth because of the possibility of birds getting their feet entangled in the strings. Also, yarns, strings, threads and ropes longer than 4" can be hazardous, because birds can entangle their delicate feet. Pet hair is a favorite as are poultry feathers because they contain enough natural oils to help a bird's nest repel water.
Food crop of berries for next years friends. Another 20 fall through early winter berry bearing bushes feed wildlife naturally.
© Copyright North American Wildlife Health Care Center
P.O. Box 155
Black Mountain, North Carolina, USA 28711
A non-profit 501-3-C organization dedicated to wildlife research and education
Place the nesting materials where birds can see them easily. Place nesting materials on shrubs, over a clothesline or in a suet basket and hang from a tree branch. Never place nesting materials in a nest box. Birds might think it was already occupied.
What to offer birds?
String that is no longer than 4"
Yarn that is no longer than 4"
Small rope no longer than 4"
Soft cloth pieces
Upholstery stuffing
Scraps of fur
Recently shed or combed pet hair
Cotton
Sphagnum moss
Clean Poultry feathers
Dried grasses
Healthy human hair
Pieces of wool
Soft bristles from old paint brushes
Do not offer terry cloth because of the possibility of birds getting their feet entangled in the strings. Also, yarns, strings, threads and ropes longer than 4" can be hazardous, because birds can entangle their delicate feet. Pet hair is a favorite as are poultry feathers because they contain enough natural oils to help a bird's nest repel water.
Food crop of berries for next years friends. Another 20 fall through early winter berry bearing bushes feed wildlife naturally.
© Copyright North American Wildlife Health Care Center
P.O. Box 155
Black Mountain, North Carolina, USA 28711
A non-profit 501-3-C organization dedicated to wildlife research and education
Spring has Sprung
Spring has Sprung
Spring has taken her rightful position as queen of the season only yesterday. Winter will tease spring several times during the next few weeks until the cold winds are blown out for another season.
Spring will not be deterred, thank the power that steers the universe. Whether is has been a cold, snowy winter, or a mild one, spring renews man's spirits, as it has for eons. Our ancestors surely crawled out of the caves, shed their animal skin coverings, and warmed themselves in the sun. The feeling is still the same.
Man sheds his heavy winter coats, gloves, and toboggans and sweatshirts, and greets the sun enthusiastically every year.
Man is still awed by the magic of seeds sprouting. It is still somewhat magical to ponder how sap at the roots of trees and shrubs knows when to begin its methodical movement upward toward leaf buds. Last weekend I pushed the leaves away from a portion of the lily bed, and surprised budding plants and myself. It is time that they were pushing through the earth, but finding them working, as they should be is always a pleasant early spring surprise. They have lay dormant for months, and now are working hard to put on an early
summer show that I wait for 11 months every year.
The early spring garden always brings my grandmother close to me again, as does the summer growing season. My fondest memories of her are in her kitchen creating delicacies for her family and preserving food for the worst of all winters to come. When she wasn't in the kitchen, she was in the garden prodding plants to produce for her kitchen. She knew flowers and vegetables like she knew her children and their children.
My grandmother had firm thoughts about daylight saving time. Her clock, the one that hung in the kitchen on the wall above her dough board table, always showed "God's time," and she didn't believe in setting it ahead or back.
The days are beginning to stretch in the morning and evening. Man earns his keep day to day, but those in tune with nature also live season to season. You sense the changing seasons most when you dig in the dirt.
Spending early years on a west Tennessee farm, tagging around after a German grandfather who spent his life farming, gave me a keen sense of what it meant to live season to season. The mind works with the season at hand, but ponders the season to follow.As I uncover plants beginning their spring growth cycle, my mind sees them in full bloom in early summer. It makes all the early spring gardening work well worth the aching back and sore muscles.
Regardless of how you feel about starlings being the one of the major pests of the western world, notice their brilliant yellow bills. They turn yellow as the breeding season approaches. The bill begins to change color at the base and the yellow spreads outward to the tip. The robin's bill is the same color in the springtime. It is signs of the season.
Purple martin houses need to be up and in place to receive the flocks coming in. Blue birds are already examining houses and choosing where they will nest this year. If you are putting up new houses, don't be discouraged if bluebirds decided to not nest in them this year. Sometimes it takes a season of looking,
examining, and then accepting them by the birds. All birdhouses should be cleaned and ready for use by the
time spring arrives.
In nature, spring is the season of reproduction. Wild turkeys are courting and will establish continue to gobble through April. Male red-winged blackbirds are arriving and setting up territories around area ponds. Mourning doves are beginning to pair and coo. Some doves will raise as many as five pairs of
offspring before next fall. The female lays only two eggs, and then begins to incubate them. Squirrels are already busy having their first babies of the year. Songbirds are singing and calling for mates. Nature has risen from the depths of darkness and cold again.
May you always hear the whisper of wings.
© Copyright North American Wildlife Health Care Center
P.O. Box 155
Black Mountain, North Carolina, USA 28711
A non-profit 501-3-C organization dedicated to wildlife research and education
Spring has taken her rightful position as queen of the season only yesterday. Winter will tease spring several times during the next few weeks until the cold winds are blown out for another season.
Spring will not be deterred, thank the power that steers the universe. Whether is has been a cold, snowy winter, or a mild one, spring renews man's spirits, as it has for eons. Our ancestors surely crawled out of the caves, shed their animal skin coverings, and warmed themselves in the sun. The feeling is still the same.
Man sheds his heavy winter coats, gloves, and toboggans and sweatshirts, and greets the sun enthusiastically every year.
Man is still awed by the magic of seeds sprouting. It is still somewhat magical to ponder how sap at the roots of trees and shrubs knows when to begin its methodical movement upward toward leaf buds. Last weekend I pushed the leaves away from a portion of the lily bed, and surprised budding plants and myself. It is time that they were pushing through the earth, but finding them working, as they should be is always a pleasant early spring surprise. They have lay dormant for months, and now are working hard to put on an early
summer show that I wait for 11 months every year.
The early spring garden always brings my grandmother close to me again, as does the summer growing season. My fondest memories of her are in her kitchen creating delicacies for her family and preserving food for the worst of all winters to come. When she wasn't in the kitchen, she was in the garden prodding plants to produce for her kitchen. She knew flowers and vegetables like she knew her children and their children.
My grandmother had firm thoughts about daylight saving time. Her clock, the one that hung in the kitchen on the wall above her dough board table, always showed "God's time," and she didn't believe in setting it ahead or back.
The days are beginning to stretch in the morning and evening. Man earns his keep day to day, but those in tune with nature also live season to season. You sense the changing seasons most when you dig in the dirt.
Spending early years on a west Tennessee farm, tagging around after a German grandfather who spent his life farming, gave me a keen sense of what it meant to live season to season. The mind works with the season at hand, but ponders the season to follow.As I uncover plants beginning their spring growth cycle, my mind sees them in full bloom in early summer. It makes all the early spring gardening work well worth the aching back and sore muscles.
Regardless of how you feel about starlings being the one of the major pests of the western world, notice their brilliant yellow bills. They turn yellow as the breeding season approaches. The bill begins to change color at the base and the yellow spreads outward to the tip. The robin's bill is the same color in the springtime. It is signs of the season.
Purple martin houses need to be up and in place to receive the flocks coming in. Blue birds are already examining houses and choosing where they will nest this year. If you are putting up new houses, don't be discouraged if bluebirds decided to not nest in them this year. Sometimes it takes a season of looking,
examining, and then accepting them by the birds. All birdhouses should be cleaned and ready for use by the
time spring arrives.
In nature, spring is the season of reproduction. Wild turkeys are courting and will establish continue to gobble through April. Male red-winged blackbirds are arriving and setting up territories around area ponds. Mourning doves are beginning to pair and coo. Some doves will raise as many as five pairs of
offspring before next fall. The female lays only two eggs, and then begins to incubate them. Squirrels are already busy having their first babies of the year. Songbirds are singing and calling for mates. Nature has risen from the depths of darkness and cold again.
May you always hear the whisper of wings.
© Copyright North American Wildlife Health Care Center
P.O. Box 155
Black Mountain, North Carolina, USA 28711
A non-profit 501-3-C organization dedicated to wildlife research and education
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
