![]() Some say it’s for protection against hawks and owls. There are various theories about why crows mob up like that. Last Christmas Day we had at least a hundred in our backyard alone. Many evenings at dusk, crows from all over Brunswick congregate in the trees surrounding the soccer field behind our house. I do admire the society of crows however. But the fact that they caw when I caw, or vice versa, does not mean we know a darn thing about one another. I guess, though I am a Pisces, I regard the crow as a totem animal more so than I do a fish. My devotion to crows goes only so far as to have a crow doormat at the back door and a crow t-shirt in my drawer. I just enjoy them as winged beings with whom I share an ecosystem. Heinrich has been known to climb snow-covered trees in the dark in the dead of winter to count ravens. Not only would his hand-reared birds come when he called, they had names. I wish I had the patience of biologist Bernd Heinrich, a noted authority on corvids and author of “Mind of the Raven” and “Ravens in Winter.” I visited Heinrich years ago at the cabin near Weld where he does some of his research. Not so a crow.Ĭrows also share food willingly, while gulls will fight over it so furiously that they sometimes end up not getting any as the crows and squirrels make off with the spoils. Seagulls will just swoop down in rowdy packs and devour whatever is there. It could just be that the crows are too smart to trust me. When they get within range, they will suddenly stab at a piece and crow-hop back as though the crust had turned into a cobra. They give the dinner scraps sidelong glances. They always land some distance away and walk nervously closer in that officious, business-like gait crows have. This being so, I can’t figure out why our backyard crows are so wary when I feed them. ![]() ![]() They are also able to recognize individual human beings. They have a varied vocabulary of caws, haws and clucks nuanced enough to distinguish meat from bread. They are imitating me.Ĭrows are about as intelligent as an ape. Last summer my neighbor, who has an app on his phone that identifies bird calls, actually identified me as an American Crow. When I go out to feed the crows, I offer up a credible caw-caw-caw and, if there is a crow within hearing distance it is apt to caw back, probably to tell other nearby crows, “That guy who thinks he can speak Crow is throwing food on the ground again.” Actually, it’s the other way around, Crows can talk to me. The rare and beautiful objects in the exhibition include, among other things, reliquaries, amulets, pilgrim badges, processional crosses, chalices, robes, prayer mats, holy books, prints, and a replica of a nail from Christ’s Passion.My grandchildren think I can talk to crows. The exhibition was four years in the making and features sacred and secular objects borrowed from private collections as well as from Harvard University Art Museums, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Loyola University Art Museum, Newark Museum, Boston College, and the Boston Public Library. Cantor gallery director Roger Hankins says Pilgrimage and Faith is the most ambitious show the Cantor has mounted since he arrived in 2001. The elevating display of icons and devotional artifacts is accompanied by a 350-page catalogue featuring essays by 25 scholars. “It addresses shared goals of personal development and communal solidarity as deep human needs.” “The global scope of the exhibit and accompanying collection of essays moves beyond an East/West opposition or the limitations of these faiths,” says co-curator Virginia Raguin.
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