The crow,the seagull and the magpie raced for the shelter of a cave,with the gull getting there first,the magpie second and the crow,last. As a result the gull was unscathed and kept its pure colour,the magpie was burnt in patches,and the crow was burnt black all over.
It is often said that there are more crows in the Perth metropolitan area than in the past,and that they were reasonably scarce until about 50 years ago,when feral pigeons'eggs and people feeding wild birds encouraged their spread.
Some say this is simply an excuse to cull them because they are noisy and go through rubbish bins.
Whatever the case,it is interesting to note that the crow was an important,and obviously common,metropolitan resident before Europeans arrived,and that as early as 1832 pioneer settler George Fletcher Moore,among others,complained of flocks of crows (known as"murders") raiding his cereal crops at Guildford.
Known as the undertaker of the bush,the crow is a disturbing and imposing bird with its cruel white eyes,which are brown in juvenile birds,and conspicuous"beard"of feathers.
It is common in southern and eastern Australia,and in WA its range extends south from the lower Murchison to the eastern Goldfields and across to the northern fringe of the Nullarbor Plain.
In the bush it favours lightly-wooded country,but has adapted well to farming areas,particularly piggeries,and road reserves,where it is attracted by road kill. It also likes to raid seabird rookeries and rubbish tips.
Crows breed from mid-July to late August,building bowl-shaped nests of sticks lined with bark and fur. Here they lay four to five pale green eggs,splotched with brown.
DID YOU KNOW?
Many birds have a special pocket in their gullet known as a crop,in which they store food which has been gulped too quickly for the digestive system to keep up.
The full crop of a grain-feed chicken,for example,can be felt quite easily in its upper breast.
In some birds,such as pigeons and doves,the crop also produces a thick creamy substance called"crop milk",similar to the cream of cows'milk,formed by the disintegration of the crop's lining.
This substance,which is rich in protein,is fed to nestlings during their first few days.