OHIO-BIRDS Archives

January 2011

OHIO-BIRDS@LISTSERV.MIAMIOH.EDU

Options: Use Monospaced Font
Show Text Part by Default
Show All Mail Headers

Message: [<< First] [< Prev] [Next >] [Last >>]
Topic: [<< First] [< Prev] [Next >] [Last >>]
Author: [<< First] [< Prev] [Next >] [Last >>]

Print Reply
Subject:
From:
Reply To:
Date:
Fri, 7 Jan 2011 02:08:27 -0800
Content-Type:
text/plain
Parts/Attachments:
text/plain (20 lines)
   Living down here in Merriman Valley we would get small flocks of crows in the late afternoon from the north heading south. In the mornings we would get them heading back north. Several years ago while hiking the Towpath Trail near the Mustill Store in Akron I counted over 600 crows coming off roost and heading due east into downtown Akron. If I was getting upwards of 100 coming over my house from the north and over 600 heading east, where were these crows roosting and just how many, I wondered. Curiousity finally got the best of me and so the search was on. 
   I speculated several areas including the park around St. Sebastian school off Mull Ave., Portage Country Club, J. Edward Good Park Golf Course or perhaps the woods around Rolling Acres Mall. After searching yesterday afternoon in the steady snow and clouds and finding nothing I'd thought we'd struck out. As we were headed back north on S. Hawkins Ave. towards home thinking we'd try when the conditions were better we spotted the first lead crow coming from the north. Behind him was a massive flock that was hard to guesstimate because there was no end to the flock. We turned around and followed the flock, zig-zagging from one block to the next, until finally reaching a stopping point which was basically a one-block residential area. This is a 1 block square of Diagonal Rd., Bellevue Ave., East Ave and Bisson Ave. in West Akron.
   When we got there the first flock was staging in the trees and after about 3 trips around the block a second large flock was streaming in from the northeast. Two more trips around the block revealed a third, smaller flock streaming in from the south. We parked at the back parking lot of the First Apostolic Faith Church on Bellevue Ave. and watched as the trees filled with raucous crows. These trees were right in peoples backyards on a residential block and not off in some remote woodlot as I expected. I assume the residents are simply used to this nightly spectacle and being cooped up inside their houses during the winter months must make them tolerant of this.
   As for the numbers of crows it was impossible to count. With flocks streaming in from 3 different directions and the birds staging in trees and working their way into the middle of the roost, then all the birds jostling for position again and again, I stopped trying. My only guess would be upwards of 2,000 birds, which I know is quite small compared to many reported communal winter roosts of American Crows, but I thought it was pretty impressive for one neighborhood block in a city like Akron.
 
Douglas W. Vogus & Michelle Zager - Akron, Ohio. 




______________________________________________________________________

Ohio-birds mailing list, a service of the Ohio Ornithological Society.
Our thanks to Miami University for hosting this mailing list.
Additional discussions can be found in our forums, at www.ohiobirds.org/forum/.

You can join or leave the list, or change your options, at:
http://listserv.muohio.edu/scripts/wa.exe?LIST=OHIO-BIRDS
Send questions or comments about the list to: [log in to unmask]

ATOM RSS1 RSS2