My Little Golden Book of Phobias

The crows are making a racket outside. I came home from a dog walk and stepping out of the car, they were swarming and yelling. At first I looked high into the trees. Then I saw this:

A Cooper's hawk methodically tearing off the feathers of a fallen crow. I moved closer and she stared at me without moving. The crows are hollering all around her as she dismantles her dinner, one feather at a time.

My house is on a ridge and every morning the crows in their hundreds fly north. Then in the evening, they come back. I think they roost 10 miles or so south of me. They stream south, in two's and three's stopping to sit on wires or a tree. I like to think they are going to work in the morning and coming home at night.

Just before I took Felix out I had been reading The Genius of Birds by Jennifer Ackerman. And I watched this     

So a day spent with crows. And Cooper's hawks.

They are smarter, much smarter than we know.