Fish Crow Goes Fishing
A Fish Crow goes fishing.
“The Stalk”
“Dive”
“Score!”
“Fish for Dinner”
“Just Before The Gulp”
Fish Crows are highly intelligent. And they will eat just about anything they can find or steal.
And, yes, they fish too. It is thought that Fish Crows learn to fish by watching other wading birds or gulls, or maybe with their smartness, they just figure it out themselves.
Wow! I’ve watched the Great Blue Heron and Egret come up with a catch repeatedly through the years on the pond behind my office. But I hadn’t seen a crow catch anything but crumbs and cigarette butts in the parking lot! Great work with that… I ‘m sure it took some patience! William — “What a wildly wonderful world, God! You made it all, with Wisdom at Your side, made earth overflow with your wonderful creations.” Psalms 104 The Message
Thank you, William! I had never seen a crow do this before myself. It was a fascinating sighting! 🙂
Great sequence Donna, well caught!
Thank you, Brian!
Great catch
Thanks Ted!
I love this! Must admit I don’t think about crows ‘fishing’ along the shoreline. Thanks for the info.
Thank you, it was a cool sighting watching the crow ‘act like a heron’. 🙂
Nice Donna! Reminds me of our old home. We had a small pond and we put in a variety of fish. We noticed they were disappearing. Then we saw that crows were picking them off over time.
Thanks Reed! Wow, I guess once they learned how, your fish were easy targets. 😲
It’s always a rewarding experience when a nature photographer can anticipate a behavior of an animal in its habitat that the casual observer would otherwise not give a second thought. And it’s even better when you combine much needed patience with careful observation and the all important skill to know when to begin to press the shutter to capture and share images of the decisive moment! Nicely done Donna!!
Thank you very much, Steve! I was glad I spotted and witnessed this behavior, seeing something quite out of the norm in my birding adventures. If s/he were white or blue, you’d have thought it was a egret/heron doing the fishing! 🙂
It has strong legs. ☺️
Most definitely, they hardly moved in all the photos! 🙂
Never knew crows fish like this !!!🙄
Me neither, Indira!! 🙂
Fun series, Donna!
Thank you, Ellen!
Great series, Donna. Corvids are such fascinating birds!
Thank you, Eliza!
Nice sequence of photos, Donna! It is a good fisher.
Thank you, Belinda, s/he sure is, I was surprised!
I must keep an eye on the crows that stand beside our rivers. I never thought that they might be fishing.
I will also be keeping my eye on crows around the water from now on. 🙂
We don’t have the fish crow on the west coast. I found this series fascinating, Donna — terrific photos.
Thank you, Jet! I’ll definitely be watching crows around water more often. 🙂
A Crow fishing is very intriguing Donna, yes they are deemed the most intelligent bird species, and they are very good at solving problems. I have never seen our Aussie Ravens fishing it could be a healthy source of food for them also.
Thank you, Ashley, this was fascinating to witness and capture, I had never seen this behavior before. You’re right, it’s got to be healthier to eat live fish than rotting food and trash.
Crows are smart critters. I think I told you about witnessing a couple of them tag-teaming and irritating a squirrel for sport.
I’ll be paying more attention to them after seeing this one stalking and fishing like a small heron or egret. 🙂
Beautiful! Oh I keep hoping and praying for a stray Fish Crow to make its way to Chicago… I love their caws. And of course they are brilliant or they wouldn’t be crows. 🙂
Thank you, Lisa! I’ll put the word out to them to visit you! They’re smart enough to find you I bet! 🙂
What a skilled “fisherman” he is!
They resemble one of the 2 types of crows we have here.
I agree, crows are very smart, charming and often underappreciated.
I hope you are having a great week 🙂
Thank you, Takami, he certainly is! I was impressed and surprised to watch it imitating a small heron/egret during the ‘stalk’. Definitely caught my eye!
Having an awesome week, been really busy having fun birding and biking! (got a new bike, feel like a kid again lol) I hope you’re have a wonderful weekend! 🙂
Nice capture of the fish. They are quite abundant here in Jacksonville, but I’ve never gotten close enough to one to capture this behavior. My encounter with them is observing them sitting high upon an electrical wire overlooking the fisherman on the bridges. Maybe they are just waiting for the carnage of bait to be dumped once the human fishing is done.
Thank you, Lisa! Yes, they do love to hang around fisherman who toss carnage or the boat docks when they clean the fish & filet, which I’ve been watching from our camp site across the river. They compete with the Brown Pelicans over here!
Reblogged this on Wolf's Birding and Bonsai Blog.
Great job capturing them in action … living up to their name!
Thank you, Denise!
Amazing capture, Donna!
Thank you, Martha!
Leave it to the Corvids to figure it out.
😊