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Answers From Your Friendly Farmer

Question: What to do about crows?
We have a problem and it's getting bigger. You see, years ago, between Campbell, Struthers, Poland, and the Pennsylvania line, there were a lot of farms. Well, the farmers died off and the land was sold and now there are houses where the farms once were. For years, CROWS gleaned the fields on the farms...now they're in the cities.

The other day I was coming from Struthers Sparkle Market, turned onto Overlook, and it was the night before trash pickup. There were HUNDREDS of crows digging into trash bags making one heck of a mess.

Years ago, you worried about dogs, cats, or raccoons digging in your trash, now there are hundreds of CROWS digging into them and I don't really see a solution. Do they have a natural enemy? Wish he/she were here.

Mahoning Valley Farmer Answer:
I have done some checking on crow problems and here is what I have found.

Crows are pests all over the world. In Japan they have attacked children on their way to school stealing their lunches. Japan has hired people to tear down the nest of crows. Crows are so smart that they have built fake nests, so the workers tear down nests that do not contain any eggs. Young crows will try to eat about anything. One person had his car parked on the street and crows kept eating the wiper blades off the car.

Crows are useful as scavengers and will eat a wide variety of things including: insects, frogs, small snakes, eggs, mice, dead animal carcasses and newly planted crops such as corn. These highly intelligent birds are very social and the flock is in constant communication with each other, making hunting or capturing crows very difficult.

The best way to get rid of crows is to eliminate their food source. Some steps taken to reduce food sources include putting garbage into yellow plastic bags, a color the birds supposedly cannot see through. Also covering the trash with fine-mesh netting, to prevent large beaks from reaching the goodies within. For our area the best solution would be to put garbage in large heavy garbage cans.

Crows like to roost in heavily wooded areas. One thing that can be done is to thin tree branches from their specific roost trees. Thinning trees from heavily wooded areas, reduces the availability of perch sites and opens the woods up to the effects of weather, eliminating their shelter.

Owls are the natural enemy of crows. Owls simply decapitate crows

In the state of Ohio it is legal to hunt crows. The season started June 6, 2008 and goes to March 15, 2009. You can hunt crows in Ohio during the season only on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays.

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