Well it's strangely coincedental that the best threads of the day were about the death of mice and squirrels. The epic struggle of survival in the modern world is played out in the form of small critters and how us stinky hairless monkies interact and percieve of them. The threads reminded me of something i witnessed just a few days ago, and the premise demands that i repeat a story that i may have already shared on here before, oh well.
Early in the morning speeding along the freeway to work i noticed a crow hopping around erratically. As i passed i noticed he was chasing a rat. The side of the freeway was vast, a good 10 feet or so of shoulder. The crow was busy pecking at the rat and the rat was altering it's course trying to escape. There was no food in the form of trash or road kill to be seen that they could have been fighting over. i drove by slightly bewildered asking myself what the hell was going on here....
Flashback to 8 years or so ago. Working on the roof on a job in the summer. It was a school and it needed to be completed before the kids returned so it was a summer of 10-12 hour days 7 days a week. Temperatures were high and patience short.
That being said there was only one guy there that would get bent out of shape when the crows would fly over to us during lunch break to try to grab a scrap of food we would either feed them or leave behind. This guy would yell at the birds, throw rocks at the birds, and toss them garbage instead of food. He essentially was a complete asshole to these birds.
Well after a week or so that same guy starts yelling around to the other roofers on who stole his fresh pack of smokes. He claims he knows where he left them and somebody stole em blah blah blah. Attention was called to the far part of the roof where we all ran over to witness the crows ripping apart a new pack of Marlboros. They had flew the smokes off the roof onto the ground, away from the ladder. So that way the roofer couldn't jump down to retaliate. Ignoring his screams he finally ran over to collect his smokes and the pack had been opened and every single cigarette had been pecked apart.
True frikkin story, them birds are smart.
So back to the rat and the crow on the side of the freeway. Why would this crow be ****ing with the rat i thought. The answer was simple, that crow was trying to herd that rat into traffic. He was attempting to use the speeding traffic to make himself a nice road kill meal.
Nature is awesome....
Early in the morning speeding along the freeway to work i noticed a crow hopping around erratically. As i passed i noticed he was chasing a rat. The side of the freeway was vast, a good 10 feet or so of shoulder. The crow was busy pecking at the rat and the rat was altering it's course trying to escape. There was no food in the form of trash or road kill to be seen that they could have been fighting over. i drove by slightly bewildered asking myself what the hell was going on here....
Flashback to 8 years or so ago. Working on the roof on a job in the summer. It was a school and it needed to be completed before the kids returned so it was a summer of 10-12 hour days 7 days a week. Temperatures were high and patience short.
That being said there was only one guy there that would get bent out of shape when the crows would fly over to us during lunch break to try to grab a scrap of food we would either feed them or leave behind. This guy would yell at the birds, throw rocks at the birds, and toss them garbage instead of food. He essentially was a complete asshole to these birds.
Well after a week or so that same guy starts yelling around to the other roofers on who stole his fresh pack of smokes. He claims he knows where he left them and somebody stole em blah blah blah. Attention was called to the far part of the roof where we all ran over to witness the crows ripping apart a new pack of Marlboros. They had flew the smokes off the roof onto the ground, away from the ladder. So that way the roofer couldn't jump down to retaliate. Ignoring his screams he finally ran over to collect his smokes and the pack had been opened and every single cigarette had been pecked apart.
True frikkin story, them birds are smart.
So back to the rat and the crow on the side of the freeway. Why would this crow be ****ing with the rat i thought. The answer was simple, that crow was trying to herd that rat into traffic. He was attempting to use the speeding traffic to make himself a nice road kill meal.
Nature is awesome....
