694. Crow Roosts and Roosting Crows. [August, 
tions as upon his own experience. They are as follows: “At 
the same season (autumn) they (crows) retire in immense num- 
bers to roost by the margins of ponds, lakes and rivers, covered 
with a luxurious growth of rank weeds or cat-tails, They 
may be seen proceeding to such places more than an hour before 
sunset, in long, straggling lines and in silence, and are joined by 
the grackles, starlings and reed-birds, while the fish-crows retire 
from the very same parts to the interior of the woods, many miles 
distant from any shores.” 
In his “Manual” we find Nuttall quoting from Wilson’s ac- 
es count, adding thereto additional information of a roost on Reedy 
island, in the River Delaware. 
By far the most complete and reliable account of the roosting 
habit of our crow is to be found in a little work entitled “ Rambles 
ofa Naturalist,” by Dr. John Godman, who at one time filled the 
` chair of anatomy at Rutger’s College. ; 
_ Godman resided, about the year 1825, as country physician in 
Anne Arundel county, Maryland, which place afforded him ample 
opportunity for observing every phase of crow life throughout 
` the year. Perhaps the best introduction I can give to the crow- 
t 
the night, will be in his words : . 
“ About a quarter of a mile above the house I lived in, on 
Curtis’s creek, the shore was a sand-bank or bluff twenty va 
thirty feet high, crowned with a dense young pine forest to m 
very edge. Almost directly opposite the shore was 
formed a int extending in the f f a broad sand-bar for a 
| point extending in the form o ie 
De d dormitory. 
e trees adjacent and all the shore would be literally black 
ose plumed marauders, while their increasing nr 
rally or “round up” which always precedes their final bivouac for 
eT A E Š TA n i 
eee C AS Pp a OTA eee a eee O r 
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