What you don't want to do is get on the wrong side of crows, they are intelligent and have long memories and if they perceive you as a threat they will make life difficult for you. They are also long lived. I have watched crows eyeing small squirrels, when the squirrel hides the crows will walk away as though they never intended any harm to the squirrel, or were even remotely aware of the squirrel, but I have also seen a crow carrying a dead squirrel to the bough of a tree, squirrel legs dangling and swaying as he was carried away, and where he was consumed. Crows love a dead squirrel, or food from a Chinese restaurant which they will leave in the bird bath to soak. I am always courteous to crows, but I am courteous to all my bird visitors. If I enter the garden and see birds at the bird bath I stop and back out, I can return later.
I change the water in the bird bath as soon as it looks a bit dirty, no one wants to bath in dirty water, and more birds will visit when the water is fresh and clean. If I am sitting in the garden and birds begin to visit I will stay quiet and watch them, it's all peaceful coexistence in this life. Crows will also leave gifts for you and I hope I am not anthropomorphizing them, maybe I am. Last spring I found a squirrel's paw in the bird bath water, it had been skinned and was ready to eat... well, a generous gift but not for me. Another gift, not for me, was a dead baby bird in the bird bath. A gift from the crows from a few years ago was a single penny found beside the bird bath, it was a 1957 copper penny and I wonder where they ever found this old coin. Now, here is where I am probably reading something into this gift, the date on the coin was 1957, the year after my father died and of special significance for me. When I leave our home and the crows are sitting on the electric wires over head, I feel they are a message of good luck from the universe. If the crows like you they will watch over you to make sure you are safe.
Handsome fellows!
Here is the penny left by crows
This is the squirrel’s paw, skinned and ready for consumption and left by crows
One of the first things to do in any garden is to get a bird bath; a bird bath will bring you a lot of happiness, it will even bring you joy, and there will always be interesting visitors to your garden. But the thing to know about gardens is that you have to make it a desirable place to visit or your garden will remain a square of grass surrounded by a few flower beds; you need to bring some life to your garden, you might place a bird bath in the middle of the square of grass. Go to one of the big box stores and you will find bird baths in the garden centre department, they're all made in China and most will last a year or two before disintegrating, they're made of plaster with some kind of coating that disintegrates with time. I had about four bird baths before finding my current bird bath, it seems to be well made and I've had it for about four years.
One of the things about having a bird bath is that you will have different bird visitors depending on the time of year. I have many crows visit in the spring, not as many bird visitors during the summer, and in the fall I have many visitors, robins, sparrows, gold finches, blue jays, and others. In the fall there is a frenetic energy in the air, nesting has ended and some birds are about to fly south for the winter. Great excitement! I know that sparrows are here all winter but in late September they go a bit wild flying around together, having dust baths, and having a great time in the bird bath. I watch them from our dining room window, or sitting in our car in the MacDonald’s parking lot, or I might see gold finches eating seeds left on the cone flowers. This is one reason you shouldn't cut back your garden in fall, birds enjoy the remaining seeds on the flowers and it is one less thing to do before winter. Don't rake, bag, and discard the fallen leaves, it’s less work for you, just rake the leaves onto the flower beds and they will mulch your perennials and protect them from our harsh Canadian winter. These leaves will disintegrate in the spring and your plants will emerge from a bed of leaves stronger and healthier than you ever expected. If you really dislike the look of dead leaves in your garden, wait until after the last cold spell in the spring and then uncover some of your plants, but it's not necessary to do this. Last winter was one of the longest and coldest winters I have experienced, we all dread another winter like it. But none of my plants died during the winter, they were under a bed of leaves and a few bushes were wrapped with burlap, they also survived. And then the crows returned in April or May, like the welcome friends they are.
Spring can be a chilly season here; however, spring also transitions to summer almost overnight, usually in early May. One day it’s cold, the next day I’m installing a window air conditioner. These photographs show the profound change that happens in only three months, from April to July.
Last winter, a nightmare for many of us because of the relentless extreme cold, had a beneficial effect on the garden.The garden has never been better! Flowers I thought had died and disappeared have suddenly returned and are flowering, bushes I thought dead and had cut back to ground level have come back to life, everything is flourishing!
