Thanks to Heather Nagy for alerting us to the latest bird scare
tactics, this time in Coshocton. Our current winter is not harsher: in
Columbus, December 2007 averaged 2.2 degrees F warmer than usual, and
January 2008 was warmer by 3.7 degrees. Not long ago, the city fathers
of Springfield narrowly decided not to employ lethal measures to get rid
of its winter crow roost, and similar tactics have been suggested, but
not yet acted upon, in other Ohio cities where residents refuse to
accept living in the natural world.
        Crows go to communal roosts in winter, and always have. Urban winter
roosts have proved to be safer, and crows wisely choose them. People
unable to admire crows object to them, and if they can't repel them have
always been willing to kill them. The Ohio Division of Wildlife permits
crow hunting ten months a year, with no bag limit. A unit of the
Department of Agriculture has a whole menu of poisons for crows, should
their help be enlisted.
        It reminds one of the DOW's crusade against another black communal
bird, the double-crested cormorant. Our governmental defenders of
wildlife shot nearly 2000 of them off their nests last summer, to
placate ignorant fishing interests who regard them as competitors, and
because they recently have increasingly outnumbered (though they have
not diminished) herons and egrets at nesting sites.
        Birders, at least those with eyes to see and brains to employ,
generally like crows--their antics, their obvious intelligence, their
fierce family loyalties, their abilities to get along together. We
should make our voices heard when more ignorant points of view are
featured in the news media. Let's resist persecuting crows just because
they sometimes have qualities more admirable than ours.
Bill Whan
Columbus

Heather Nagy wrote:
> "A neighborhood in Coshocton has been plagued by crows and their
> droppings this week. Residents along Mulberry Street say it looked
> like something from the Alfred Hitchcock classic  The Birds after a
> nearby flag manufacturing plant started using a booming propane
> cannon to scare the thousands of crows off its property Friday
> night. Annin and Company officials say a bird group estimated as
> many as 25,000 crows were nesting on the plants site. One resident
> says now there are so many crows in her neighborhood the trees look
> black. A health official says a harsher winter may be drawing the
> crows to buildings and pavement that retain heat."
> Heather Nagy
> Licking County

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