Crow vs Robin

On my way home from work today, I was a little startled when a large crow swerved and did a tight coil and landed about eight feet in front of me - in the road. (Those of you who know me know how much I dislike birds, but that is another post.) The point of this post is to document what happened next: a very skinny robin,** cheeping loudly, dive-bombed the crow. The crow, not having any of this insurgent behavior, immediately took off after the robin.

The robin alighted on the branch of a tree, unseen, and the crow landed on the grass, walking cockily up and down. There were several quail nearby, as well. The robin continued to cheep angrily, while the crow pretended not to listen (reminds me of some past interactions with some sisters of mine, but that is also for another post). The crow proceeded to bully a nearby pigeon, causing it to fly away, across the street, by where I was. By now I had stopped and was just watching, carefully. The crow gave the air of not being ruffled, but it really was, and walked over to bully a few more pigeons.

One pigeon, who had just decided to fly from a (safe) branch to the ground, decided it didn't want to be too close to the crow, but was too close to the ground before it could make up its mind and ended up doing a belly flop. I seriously have never seen a bird belly flop, but it did. Rather ungainly looking; I hope I never have occasion to see it happen again. 

The robin dive-bombed again. And again. The crow was clearly getting annoyed and was taking it out on the pigeons, snapping at them. The robin decided to give it one more try, squawking madly the entire time, but the crow had had enough, and went aloft, the robin in hot pursuit. Only the crow, being more wily, took a sharp turn and the robin missed and went to hang out on a branch, clearly aiming to do better next time.

Meanwhile, the crow ruffled itself and went back to terrorizing the pigeons. I left with the robin circling, still making noise, and the crow still trying to assert dominance. I wonder what the robin was so hot and bothered about.

Oh birdbrains, how I love you. You provide such entertainment.


**Perhaps in an effort to go 'green' it had given up on worms - I am used to ugly fat robins, so this one practically looked emaciated, but was really just on the slim side...