Tweets,

With all the questions "flying" about crow roosts, and having observed crows flying in force north across Bothell Way in the late afternoons, I looked at notes from a lecture by John Withey, a UW researcher. He listed 4 other sites in addition to the Foster Island roost--Brier (north of Bothell), Snohomish-Monroe Rd. (south of Snohomish), the Renton Wetlands (near Southcenter), and the Newport Marina (Mercer Slough). The lecture was in 3/04. He also noted that crows congregate in large groups before flying to the roost (I've seen this at the Fill) and that an individual crow may fly to a roost other than its "usual," based on geographic convenience. I don't know if John is still at the U, but he had been doing crow studies for a few years in conncection with a PhD, I believe. My favorite part of his lecture was his story about how some crows could pick him out in a crowd and would dive bomb him, recognizing that he was the guy who regularly intruded upon their campus nests!

Penny Koyama, Bothell
plkoyama at verizon.net