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MY CROW(S) AND ME

December 3,2025

As of late, I’ve developed the challenge, and the heart, to befriend a crow.  I say crow(s) because it can be interesting to try to discern one crow from another.  They look identical…right? or do they?

I choose to believe that it is one particular crow.  The one who left me that penny on my bedroom windowsill this summer.

 It all started with a tug on my heart in the summer of 2025. For reasons I don’t know, I began to desire a bond with a crow.  I thought it would be cool to befriend one of the noisy and persistently bold birds that periodically present themselves on my front yard. I had been feeling the desire for their friendship for a few weeks before the penny mysteriously showed up.

THE BACKGROUND AND THE BUILDUP

It was a Sunday morning. During my breakfast I had read about consciousness in the lifestyle section of the Epoch Times. There was an article about a man with a family and a job who had only 30% of his brain functioning due to hydrocephalus.  There was a case study about him because of his capacity to function seemingly normally, in spite of the fact that he did not have a fully functioning brain.  The phenomenon is leading more research in the source of consciousness because clearly, it is not seated within the brain like science has always maintained. The idea of consciousness lingered in my mind for days.

That evening, I had a dream about my crow. Well, it’s not actually ‘my crow’. Not yet. Hopefully eventually however we will be friends. In my dream there were 2 birds on a fence railing. One of the birds was a female cardinal. There are two cardinal pairs that live on my property. One of the females even laid 3 eggs in my wygalia bush this past summer.

So, I wasn’t surprised she showed up in my dream. There was a beautiful jet black crow perched on the railing to her right. I put out my right hand and the smaller bird hopped onto my open palm. The crow sat there and allowed my to pet it on the head with my left hand before it flew away. This was all in my dream on that Sunday night.

I got up the next morning to put birdseed out on my bedroom windowsill. And thats when I discovered the 1993 penny just sitting there. This was a mystery to me because the window sill is nearly 7 feet from the ground. There is a huge rhodadendran bush in front of the window as well. When the penny showed up and I wrote about it in a facebook post, friends all said that that was crow behavior. Afterwards I did a bit of research to see if other birds (like sparrows, cardinals or even the occasional blue jay that landed on my windowsill) have been noted to bring items to human beings.  Apparently, its consistently afforded only to crows.

Crows are considered the smartest of all the birds in the avian kingdom.  I had never seen a crow land on my windowsill for food like the other birds that gather there.  Plus, since there is a large rhododendron bush in front of that bedroom window, I couldn’t imagine how a crow would manage to squeeze into that space.  But, they are the smartest of all birds I am told, so maybe they have their clever ways.

Maybe my crow (which I now love to call it)  was aware that I had begun a practice of feeding the birds in my yard to create a sort of bird sanctuary in my own suburban plot.  I had birdhouses and bird feeders and even a bird bath. Maybe it was watching over the summer and decided it wanted a part of the action.

I can’t help but consider the possibility that my consciousness mingled with that particular crow’s consciousness. Maybe the desires of my heart mingled with the heart of a crow. Maybe consciousness is a vast energy that is God, and there is really no separation between our consciousness and all of nature’s. Maybe a human’s consciousness can mingle with a bird’s consciousness.  And to take it a step further, maybe it was the crow’s consciousness that quickened my own heart.  Maybe the crow initiated the desire for me to befriend it?  It’s the ‘what came first’ quandary …the chicken or the egg; and in this case, the crow or the human being? This is a mystery I love to dance with in my quiet moments in my garden.

COHABITATING WITH THE BIRDS.

December 10,2025

I’ve lived here for over 20 years with my husband Larry. The first nearly 15 years we had a Bengal cat named Luna who was a master hunter. I even witnessed her leap and nearly catch a hummingbird one summer. She’d proudly bring me little animals (unharmed baby bunny rabbit, or chipmunk or even a bird). I didn’t want to risk a baby bird falling out of a birdhouse and it becoming a delightful toy or meal for Luna.  And I didn’t trust her desire to leap to the birdfeeder as a chickadee fed on sunflower seeds. So, I never bothered inviting birds into my gardens. Luna reigned supreme. It was her kingdom.

Luna died at the age of 19 a few years ago. So, this past spring of 2025, I finally realized that there was nothing stopping me from creating a bird sanctuary so up went the bird feeders. Suet cages hang strategically. Bird feeders for sunflower seeds and a variety of smaller seeds are hanging in my gardens. I have several bird feeders hanging throughout my front yard. Birds of all types and species gather. The morning doves prefer to pick up scattered seeds on the ground below the feeders. There are the exquisite and charming cardinals and the loud and proud blue jays. The woodpeckers (of all sizes) would devour the giant suet if left to their own resources.

I began purchasing a type of suet with cayenne pepper as a way of discouraging the always ravenous squirrels from competing with the birds for it. I didn’t know that the birds don’t have the taste buds to be bothered by the pepper. But squirrels do. And, oh do the squirrels disrupt my bird watching. My husband had purchased a water gun for my grandson that summer and we began using that to scare off the squirrels who tried to claim ownership of the birdfeeders. The stream of water reached over 20 feet and the sound was startling. It worked to scare the rascals away, but it was a constant battle. The battling dragged out all Spring and into the summer, but it appeared that by the fall of 2025 that we had won that war. (at least for the moment).

I began adding a cupful of seeds to my windowsill that summer as well and was thrilled when the birds began lighting upon the sill for breakfast every day. Now they live by the dozens in the azalea bush and winter jasmine in front of my bedroom. It reminds me of a sort of bird condominium. It’s a great life for them. They have reliable security and sanctuary in the bushes and a reliable food source in the mornings. A variety of sparrows can be fairly noisy when the sun come up in summer.  But it’s so much more charming than an alarm clock. I can hear there back and forth chatter from the bushes when they awaken and the half awake me knows that dawn has arrived.

Usually one of them will begin a demanding ‘chirp’ on the rhodadendren bush limb. Its my cue. My new alarm clock. They are ready for me to pour a cup of their birdseed on the windowsill. They have me well trained. They come get their breakfast and then return to their bush or fly around and do what birds do and return at nightfall to their safe space. It’s like we are now cohabitating and I love every minute of it.

ENTER MY CROW

December 26, 2025

Maybe the crow was trying to get my attention and my friendship.  Maybe it had been observing from it’s perch in a high branch the array of free food all over my yard and wanted a piece of the action.  Or maybe it simply wanted my friendship, and it left me the penny to capture my attention.

It was a 1993 penny that sat on the 6 inch stone windowsill outside my bedroom. The Monday morning it showed up followed a dream I had the night before. I dreamt that there was a female cardinal on a fence railing sitting beside a crow.  I put out my hand and the smaller bird hopped onto my palm. The crow sat there and let me pet it on its head for a bit before it flew off.  A sparrow chirped me to the window sill on the Monday morning as I awakened from that dream.  And there was the penny.

That penny altered my life in a delightfully charming way.  It blossomed my attentiveness to the birds in my yard into something lovelier and so much fun.  My husband and I get so much joy now watching the array of birds outside our kitchen window as we drink our morning coffees.  We have a beautiful red maple directly in front of our kitchen window with bird feeders and even birdhouses.  It’s become our morning ( and daily) entertainment. We’re both now ‘semi-retired. Maybe that has given us the pleasure of taking a deeper breath of life and enjoy what God provides in ways we took for granted before. There is joy in ‘slowing down’.

I began doing some internet research about crows and learned, amongst other things, that they love dog kibble.   I have a dog, Angus. He’s a sweet Scottish terrier/ schnauzer mix. He didn’t seem to mind my stealing a cup of his kibble each morning to feed my new friends. Although, he’s totally curious as to where I’m going with his dog food each morning. After I feed him I’ll scoop up more kibble and carry it outside. He gives a single bark as I close the door behind me and head to the stone bench that I’ve allocated for the crow’s new meal location.

I began placing the scoop of kibble on a stone bench in my front garden near the street.  That has become their spot for their daily buffet.

I can tell when they are near, because they are so loud.  Loud means that you can hear them when they are blocks away…and really loud when they are either hovering over my yard or close by in my neighbors yard.  We are learning each other…me and my crow.

WHO’S TRAINING WHO?

A pattern has developed between me and my crow (or my crow family).  I know it’s the same crow (and it’s partner or spouse) because they come in two’s.  I can hear the caw-caw nearby so I know its calling me letting me know it’s near. It’s becoming a daily ritual. I put a cupful of kibble on the bench.  Sometimes I add a handful of shelled peanuts or organic cherrioes, or even stale sourdough bread that I soaked a bit ahead of time to soften it. I’ve begun to do my own human ‘caw-caw’ back to them.  I’ve no doubt that my neighbors who actually witness me doing this have concluded that that gray haired old lady is nut job, but I don’t care.  I am having way too much fun creating this interactive dance with my crows. There’s is some benefit to being my age. There’s a deeper appreciating for what matters in this life. Like as we age we’re given access to a deeper knowing of why we are here on this earth. And what other people think of us simply takes a back sit to living God’s life to its fullest.

Once the food is on the stone bench in my garden my ‘job’ is done. I usually go back to my kitchen and watch from my window with my morning coffee in hand. Nine times out of ten, my crow will  appear within 3-5 minutes for it’s breakfast! At this point, I don’t know if its me training them or they are training me, and there again, I don’t care.  There is such levity in dancing with nature.

One day, my beautiful black beauty appeared and he was joined by his partner within moments.  Usually It’s the one at first who lands on the ground by the stone bench.  He bobbed his head a bit which looks like he’s peeking to see whats on the bench, or simply deciding if he wants to eat.  He called out to his partner with his Caw-Caw. Sometimes in a twin staccato and sometimes a three.  Its so obvious he was calling to his mate. She showed up within minutes and landed on the street beside the bench.

They both jumped up and began pecking at the peanuts.  This was the first time I used peanuts mixed with the kibble.  He took one peanut and flew across the street to my neighbor’s roof.  He worked his way down to the rain gutter and it looked like he was pecking at the rain gutter. The other crow pecked at the food on the bench and flew across the street to the grass and pecked at the grass. They came back to the bench and repeated the same pattern. I asked my husband to google if crows store food for winter like squirrels do.

Sure enough they do!  They’re known to hide their food in rain gutters and other places.  Often they will try to deceive any observing predators by making it look like they are burying their loot somewhere else (like the ground) and then hide it somewhere else.  I saw the one crow peck at the ground and then fly to the top of a narrow evergreen. It poked around at the top, which swayed by the weight of the crow.  I suspected that it was hiding its peanut in a nest at the top of the evergreen.

One morning I had a piece of sourdough toast that had become hard sitting on my counter for a day.  I softened it a bit with water and broke it into smaller pieces.  I was stunned to catch a peek at my crow dunking the bread into the bird bath water to soften it up to make it more edible.

Another morning I watched the 2 crows at their stone bench buffet. I could feel their enthusiasm across the yard. They were loving the peanuts I added with their feast that morning. A couple of houses down I saw a handful of other crows ‘shouting’ at them and swooping closer to my yard. My 2 crows flew over to my neighbors tree and were screaming back at the other newcomers. It was clear to me that they were letting them know, in no uncertain terms, that this feast belonged to them! After about 10 minutes the other crows flew away, and ‘my crows’ got back to work on what they had claimed as their own. I do love my crows.

One of the charming things I notice is that they are not greedy. They may want to stake their claim on ‘their’ food, but most days they leave some behind for other scavengers. A passing crow, or cat..or the nocturnal racoon. I know its a raccoon because in the mornings all the food will be gone and a small turd is left behind to mark its own territory.