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Northern Harrier Eats Crow

This morning I saw something that caused 
me to run off the road.

A group of crows was sitting in a field
in a tight group and did not fly away after I 
drove by. As I passed them, a Northern Harrier
female dive bombed them, but they refused to 
fly, instead they hopped out of her way. On her second
graceful pass, they hopped some more. the third pass
saw her scare one into the air, and as it flew away, 
she turned upside down, flew underneath it, grabbed
it, pulled out black feathers, then dropped it on
the ground, whereupon it hopped quickly back to its
buddies. The fourth pass saw the whole flock take
to the air, whereupon she grabbed another and 
did the same trick and threw it on the ground. The
crows landed on a fence brace, saw her flying to them, 
and as a group, they jumped to the ground around
the posts. She flew away. 

A most amazing thing. Crows are very tough birds
and she was not much bigger than them. She could
clearly outfly them, though. 

She has hung around for over a year now and I saw 
a male during last winter. I have also found duck
carcasses in our fields where I have seen them 
hunting. 

I had thought harriers would only eat rodents,
but after today - ?

-Austin

-- 
Austin Moseley, Texas Bison Co, Caddo Mills, TX  903.527.2325
Vice-President, Northern Region, Texas Bison Association
Amoseley@csac.com 800.225.6204x245
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