EASTERN CROW 239 



destruction of a colony of 1,500 little blue herons and 3,000 snowy egrets 

 nesting in an island of timber known as "Live Oaks" on the coastal 

 prairie, 9 miles south of Waller, Tex., by about 40 crows that inhabited 

 the section. On Great Duck Island, off the coast of Maine, where I 

 studied a colony of black-crowned night herons for an entire season, the 

 crows destroyed 27 of the 125 nests under observation. During the 

 season of 1940 crov/s proved to be a serious menace to the eider ducks 

 nesting on Kent Island, Bay of Fundy, where Bowdoin College has 

 established a bird sanctuary and scientific station. On this island the 

 crows had the habit of carrying their booty to certain convenient places 

 to be devoured. At one such rendezvous I counted 37 eider-duck eggs 

 and 24 herring-gull eggs and in another 22 eider-duck eggs and 28 of 

 the gull eggs. Crows have been reported as carrying an entire egg in 

 their beaks, but at Kent Island the egg was usually punctured by a 

 thrust of the beak. On several occasions we observed them carrying 

 off the downy nestlings. In August I found a place where there 

 were more than a dozen juvenal gulls that had been killed and 

 partially eaten, presumably by the crows. Certainly in sanctuaries such 

 as "Live Oaks" and Kent Island, where a special effort is being 

 made to preserve certain species of birds, the control of the crows 

 i.s necessary, as it is when they become too abundant in the vicinity 

 of nesting fowl, such as in the Prairie Provinces of Canada. 



Depredations on poultry have been reported. For example, Mousley 

 (1924) states that he saw 16 young chickens carried away by crows. 

 Numerous reports have been published citing instances Avhere crows 

 have killed and eaten various species of small birds, and even birds as 

 large as the partridge have been killed and eaten. 



Such depredations, though they may call for certain measures of con- 

 trol, in no way warrant the total destruction of a species that has been 

 shown to be beneficial to man's interests at other times. In the case 

 of poultry means of protection can be readily improvised. 



Of interest but of lesser economic importance is the consumption of 

 small mammals, crustaceans, moUusks, amphibians, snakes, and carrion. 

 Eiirig (1905) found the crop of a crow filled with earthworms. Along 

 the seacoast, especially during the winter months, mollusks constitute a 

 most important element of the food. It is a common practice of the crov/ 

 to carrv clams, scallops, mussels, or sea-urchins to a considerable height 

 to let them fall on the rocks to be broken and thus enable them to 

 secure the edible contents, a habit shared by other birds, notably the 

 herring gull. 



Along the New England coast, especially in Maine, I have seen groups 

 of crows on the mud flats at low tide, where they were feeding on the 



