The following email message of today has been copied from a Norwich listserve. If you have information which might help Craig, please reply directly to him at [log in to unmask]
Thank you,
George Clark
Norwich, VT
I am looking for pre-roosting aggregations (PRAs) of crows in order to
observe social interactions among birds from different extended family
groups. These PRAs are the gathering together of multiple crow clans,
hundreds and hundreds of individuals, each afternoon before they fly off at
dusk in waves to multiple roosting sites. There are several hypotheses about
why the crows gather like this, some of which involve the sharing of
knowledge. Corvids, including ravens, crows and jays, is a quite intelligent
group of birds. This time of year the PRAs happen around 3-5 pm. I have seen
hundreds of crows leaving a PRA in Norwich, likely somewhere in the vicinity
of Town Farm Rd., Goodrich-Four Corners or maybe Bradley Hill, but I could
not pinpoint the location before they all flew off to roost. If you have
recently seen any pre-roosting aggregations (remembering this means hundreds
of birds at once), or large overnight roosts for that matter, please let me
know by responding directly to me via email. Thank you.