Whenever we amass any stale bread or crackers, we save it, put it beside the door and I take it out for the birds. I try to break the pieces as best I can so the small birds can peck away, but the primary partakers are my three crows. They fly by most every morning to see if there any extra morsels.
Crows like the larger pieces of bread, but they don’t eat them whole. Rather, they fly to our bird bath and dip the bread in the water, sort of like a fondue. The water makes the bread easier to swallow, apparently.
I really enjoy having the crows around. They never seem to bother my garden (I don’t plant corn) and they are an excellent early warning system for hawks.
Hawks are fine and dandy – in somebody else’s back yard – but I don’t want them in my yard eating my doves and cardinals. Crows help prevent that travesty. At best, they drive them away. At worst, they make a hawk’s life miserable, squawking and fussing and dive bombing.
Crows are quite interesting, one of the most intelligent birds of all. They have an extensive vocabulary and they each one pitch in to care for the young. Neat birds. Well worthy of a handful of stale bread.
