Crow Hunting Competition/Crow Appreciation Day

Spent today in Montour Falls, NY where a hunting competition was occurring.

Counting crows

Here is a new way to invest some spare time. The Millport Hunting and Fishing Club is going to hold a "crow shoot" on Feb. 11 with three-man teams paying $30 to participate.

Fee is due by Feb. 10. Top money goes to the team with the most crows. Counting takes place at 3 p.m. sharp and birds must be taken on the day of the hunt, Feb. 11. For more information call (607) 535-9114. The hunting and fishing club is at 1750 Gano Road, Montour Falls.

A lot of people were, understandably, upset about this.  The organizers of the hunt cite that oh, it's okay that we aren't eating them, because "the birds carry West Nile Virus and eat songbird eggs."

1. Crows do not "carry" West Nile Virus.  Once bitten by mosquitoes, which are the actual carriers of WNV, crows die withing 4 days.  They do not survive.  They do not "carry" the virus around.  Data from our group shows that living crows do not have antibodies to WNV, meaning if they were exposed to it they died, there were no crows that were exposed to WNV and lived.

2. Crows are songbirds too!

3. You know what is the biggest predator of songbird eggs and nestlings?  CHIPMUNKS and SQUIRRELS.  Really, I'm not kidding, there is data and nest-camera evidence that shows this.  Yes, crows eat eggs and baby birds (a lot of things do! including deer!), but no more so, and no more harmfully than you would naturally expect.

Basically this hunt was a way to kill animals for fun and they are trying to weakly justify it.

A bunch of people in Montour Falls organized several crow appreciation events and one of which was having Kevin McGowan come talk about crows and their behavior today, while the hunt happened.  My adviser, myself, and two other collaborators drove there with Kevin as added support and people who could field questions about crows.  We also took Crow Bars and t-shirts to sell along with free crow trading cards.  (We sold a LOT of chocolate bars and received a lot of donations for our zoo crows!!)

Here is an article about Kevin's talk and the hunt.  We chose a decidedly non-political stance.  The goal was to go there and talk about how awesome crows are, using facts, NOT to act as a political rally against the hunt itself.  During the talk, one person asked why crows aren't protected, so Kevin discussed that they are protected by the MBTA and how the legal hunting of crows works.  He BRIEFLY talked about how state hunting regulators need to take in to account the declines after WNV hit, as that was an unprecedented decline in crows, and that perhaps bag limits should be put in place if the decline continues.  What makes me mad is that the local news managed to spin that brief moment in Kevin's talk into being a political statement against the hunt itself.  Here is the news story/video...and the "image" is a grackle, NOT a crow...guh!

Here is another article I found this evening about the whole thing.  Additionally, the "population control" argument is brought up, which is, frankly, crap in this context.  There is NOT a huge spike in crow populations right now and their populations are not "out of control" in any way (and no, hunters are not the reason it's not out of control).  People seem to forget that roosts, in which tens of thousands of crows gather in one spot at night, is a winter phenomenon and occurs the same time every year.  Massive winter roosting is a normal part of the crow year, NOT some population spike that needs to be controlled for the good of the environment or the crows themselves.  Roosts can be super annoying because they are loud and produce a lot of bird crap, but there are much more productive means to disrupt roosts and there is no large roost in Montour Falls.  I also do not see "they are loud and poop a lot" as a justifiable reason to shoot as many animals as you can.

Basically, this really is just killing for sport and fun.  There is no function, that I can see, for the hunt that went on today.  I am not against hunting (quite the opposite!), but I am VERY against killing animals wantonly.