Saturday, June 28, 2025

More on birds, crows this time!

Welcome, I’m Mary Louisa Locke, the author of the USA Today best-selling Victorian San Francisco Mystery series and the Caelestis Science Fiction series. In this daily newsletter, I reflect on my life as an indie author trying to age gracefully. Occasionally, I will also publish some of my shorter fiction in this newsletter to read for free.

Daily Diary, Day 1760:

Edgar’s friends: Miss Teeny still hanging in there!

First of all, for those of you who actually pay attention to such details, for several days I got off track in the day of the week, the date itself, and which diary day it was. But today I got back on track (and went back and edited former posts.) I will try to pay more attention to this in the future. So, in case anyone wonders, it’s Saturday, nearing the end of June, and this is the one thousand, seven-hundred and sixtieth diary entry I have made in a row, (starting back on Facebook!) That means I have been doing this for over four years without a break. I never thought I would maintain this sort of consistency.

Yesterday, while I didn’t get any novella writing done, I really enjoyed the day, and did a good job of not over-extending myself. Consequently, the aches and pains I woke up with all slowly resolved and I didn’t need to take any advil. I think I am finally getting the hang of riding this aging rollercoaster! Anyway, I did my two walks before lunch, had my phone call after lunch, when I heard all about the giraffes, elephants, lions, baboons, gazelles, my friend saw on her trip to through nature preserves in Africa.

I also continued to get a good number of chuckles from yesterday’s pudgy baby house finch, who continued to visit the feeder yesterday. Also chuckled on my walk when I thought about a neighbor who lives a couple of streets over who has a long-running feud with local crows. He says they damage the tiles on his roof, so he goes out and chases them away by slapping his sleepers at them.

Today, as I turned down his street, I noticed about 8 or so crows flying around, or sitting on the telephone wires and complaining noisily. They were all a couple of doors down from his house, so I suspect he must have been out shooing them from his own house. Interestingly, I often see crows on my walk, and while they occasionally are sitting on roofs, they don’t tend to stay there for but a minute. That is what happens when they arrive in our block. They will also come swooping in and land on our roof to check out our olives, or sit for a minute on a neighbor’s room, but they seldom stay for more than about 10 minutes on our block before moving on to other places. But not on that neighbor’s block, which I walk down nearly every day. On his block they tend to hang out, often sitting on the telephone wires, and usually fussing noisily. Can’t help but think they are doing it on purpose—to make him angry—since I have read that they can hold a grudge against people (as well as befriend them.)

Here is a quote from one article.

Crows can recognize humans, which is remarkable in and of itself, but beyond that, they also know which humans are good humans and bad humans based on their previous experiences with them. Those bad humans they might hold grudges against, while good humans might receive gifts.

Crows' ability to recognize humans was put to the test by wildlife biologists who conducted an experiment using rubber masks. One mask was used on "dangerous" humans, while a different mask was used on humans who behaved neutrally, NPR reports. The "dangerous" humans trapped and banded crows, which can be a scary experience for a bird, even if they aren't hurt. The people wearing the neutral mask did not engage with the crows. To test the theory that crows can recognize faces, the "dangerous" humans then returned to the area where the birds had been trapped and banded, and, sure enough, the crows behaved aggressively toward them, dive bombing them and angrily calling out. Meanwhile, they mostly ignored the neutral humans.

If you get on a crow's good side instead of bad side, you might just receive a gift from it. Many cases have been documented of crows leaving gifts for humans they like. Oftentimes, the recipients of these gifts are humans that have left food out for the crows, and the gifts can include rocks, bones and lost objects like earrings and keys, according to the National Audubon Society.

My plans for today are more of the same, I have done the extra cleaning upstairs, I am about to take my first walk, I then have a regular zoom call with a friend. I will also start the last of Gibson’s books (second in this last series, which is supposed to be a trilogy…but the 3^rd book has been rumored, but no specific word on if and when it will be published.) And, if so moved, I will write.

And I suspect more bird watching will be in my future. Meanwhile, a number of the rose bushes are starting to put out a blossom or two. Here is one from a huge bush, but with mostly dead blossoms on it. The photos are over two days so you can see how it is getting rosier over time.

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