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The carrion crow (''Corvus corone'') is a
passerine A passerine () is any bird of the order Passeriformes (; from Latin 'sparrow' and '-shaped'), which includes more than half of all bird species. Sometimes known as perching birds, passerines are distinguished from other orders of birds by th ...
bird of the family
Corvidae Corvidae is a cosmopolitan family of oscine passerine birds that contains the crows, ravens, rooks, jackdaws, jays, magpies, treepies, choughs, and nutcrackers. In colloquial English, they are known as the crow family or corvids. Cu ...
and the genus ''
Corvus ''Corvus'' is a widely distributed genus of medium-sized to large birds in the family Corvidae. It includes species commonly known as crows, ravens and rooks. The species commonly encountered in Europe are the carrion crow, the hooded crow ...
'' which is native to western
Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a subcontinent of Eurasia and it is located entirel ...
and the eastern Palearctic.


Taxonomy and systematics

The carrion crow was one of the many species originally described by
Carl Linnaeus Carl Linnaeus (; 23 May 1707 – 10 January 1778), also known after his Nobility#Ennoblement, ennoblement in 1761 as Carl von Linné#Blunt, Blunt (2004), p. 171. (), was a Swedish botanist, zoologist, taxonomist, and physician who formalise ...
in his landmark 1758 10th edition of ''Systema Naturae'', and it still bears its original name of ''Corvus corone''. The binomial name is derived from the
Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
, "raven", and
Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...
, "crow". The
hooded crow The hooded crow (''Corvus cornix''), also called the scald-crow or hoodie, is a Eurasian bird species in the genus ''Corvus''. Widely distributed, it is found across Northern, Eastern, and Southeastern Europe, as well as parts of the Middle Eas ...
, formerly regarded as a subspecies, has been split off as a separate species, and there is some discussion whether the eastern carrion crow (''C. c. orientalis'') is distinct enough to warrant specific status; the two taxa are well separated, and it has been proposed they could have evolved independently in the wetter, maritime regions at the opposite ends of the
Eurasia Eurasia (, ) is the largest continental area on Earth, comprising all of Europe and Asia. Primarily in the Northern and Eastern Hemispheres, it spans from the British Isles and the Iberian Peninsula in the west to the Japanese archipelago ...
n landmass.Madge, Steve & Burn, Hilary (1994): ''Crows and jays: a guide to the crows, jays and magpies of the world''. A&C Black, London. Along with the hooded crow, the carrion crow occupies a similar ecological niche in Eurasia to the
American crow The American crow (''Corvus brachyrhynchos'') is a large passerine bird species of the family Corvidae. It is a common bird found throughout much of North America. American crows are the New World counterpart to the carrion crow of Europe an ...
(''C. brachyrhynchos'') in North America.


Description

The plumage of the carrion crow is black with a green or purple sheen, much greener than the gloss of the
rook Rook (''Corvus frugilegus'') is a bird of the corvid family. Rook or rooks may also refer to: Games *Rook (chess), a piece in chess *Rook (card game), a trick-taking card game Military * Sukhoi Su-25 or Rook, a close air support aircraft * USS ...
. The bill, legs and feet are also black. It can be distinguished from the
common raven The common raven (''Corvus corax'') is a large all-black passerine bird. It is the most widely distributed of all corvids, found across the Northern Hemisphere. It is a raven known by many names at the subspecies level; there are at least ...
by its size of around in length as compared to an average of for ravens, and from the
hooded crow The hooded crow (''Corvus cornix''), also called the scald-crow or hoodie, is a Eurasian bird species in the genus ''Corvus''. Widely distributed, it is found across Northern, Eastern, and Southeastern Europe, as well as parts of the Middle Eas ...
by its black plumage. The carrion crow has a wingspan of and weighs . There is frequent confusion between the carrion crow and the rook, another black corvid found within its range. The beak of the crow is stouter and in consequence looks shorter, and whereas in the adult rook the nostrils are bare, those of the crow are covered at all ages with bristle-like feathers. As well as this, the wings of a carrion crow are proportionally shorter and broader than those of the rook when seen in flight. Juvenile carrion crows can be identified by their brownish plumage and blue eyes, both of which darken to black and brown as the crow grows older.


Distribution and genetic relationship to hooded crows

The carrion crow (''Corvus corone'') and
hooded crow The hooded crow (''Corvus cornix''), also called the scald-crow or hoodie, is a Eurasian bird species in the genus ''Corvus''. Widely distributed, it is found across Northern, Eastern, and Southeastern Europe, as well as parts of the Middle Eas ...
(''Corvus cornix''), including the former's slightly larger allied form or race ''C. c. orientalis'', are two very closely related species; the geographic distributions of both forms of carrion crow across Europe are illustrated in the accompanying diagram. It is believed that this distribution might have resulted from the glaciation cycles during the
Pleistocene The Pleistocene ( , often referred to as the ''Ice age'') is the geological epoch that lasted from about 2,580,000 to 11,700 years ago, spanning the Earth's most recent period of repeated glaciations. Before a change was finally confirmed in ...
, which caused the parent population to split into isolates which subsequently re-expanded their ranges when the climate warmed causing secondary contact. Further reading

/ref> Poelstra and coworkers sequenced almost the entire genomes of both species in populations at varying distances from the contact zone to find that the two species were genetically identical, both in their DNA and in its expression (in the form of ''m''RNA), except for the ''lack of expression'' of a small portion (<0.28%) of the genome (situated on avian chromosome 18) in the hooded crow, which imparts the lighter plumage colouration on its torso. Thus the two species can viably hybridize, and occasionally do so at the contact zone, but the all-black carrion crows on the one side of the contact zone mate almost exclusively with other all-black carrion crows, while the same occurs among the hooded crows on the other side of the contact zone. It is therefore clear that it is only the outward appearance of the two species that inhibits hybridization. The authors attribute this to
assortative mating Assortative mating (also referred to as positive assortative mating or homogamy) is a mating pattern and a form of sexual selection in which individuals with similar phenotypes or genotypes mate with one another more frequently than would be ex ...
(rather than to ecological selection), the advantage of which is not clear, and it would lead to the rapid appearance of streams of new lineages, and possibly even species, through mutual attraction between mutants. Unnikrishnan and Akhila propose, instead, that
koinophilia Koinophilia is an evolutionary hypothesis proposing that during sexual selection, animals preferentially seek mates with a minimum of unusual or mutant features, including functionality, appearance and behavior. Koinophilia intends to explain t ...
is a more parsimonious explanation for the resistance to hybridization across the contact zone, despite the absence of physiological, anatomical or genetic barriers to such hybridization. The carrion crow is also found in the mountains and forests of Japan and also in the cities of Japan.


Behaviour and ecology

The rook is generally gregarious and the crow largely solitary, but rooks occasionally nest in isolated trees, and crows may feed with rooks; moreover, crows are often sociable in winter roosts. The most distinctive feature is the voice. The rook has a high-pitched ''kaaa'', but the crow's guttural, slightly vibrant, deeper croaked ''kraa'' is distinct from any note of the rook. The carrion crow is noisy, perching on a vantage point such as a building or the top of a tree and calling three or four times in quick succession, with a slight pause between each series of croaks. During each series of calls, a crow may perform an accompanying gesture, raising its shoulders and bowing its head and neck downwards with each caw. The wing-beats are slower, more deliberate than those of the rook. Carrion crows can become
tame Tame may refer to: *Taming, the act of training wild animals *River Tame, Greater Manchester *River Tame, West Midlands and the Tame Valley * Tame, Arauca, a Colombian town and municipality * "Tame" (song), a song by the Pixies from their 1989 al ...
near humans, and can often be found near areas of human activity or habitation including cities, moors, woodland, sea cliffs and farmland where they compete with other social birds such as
gull Gulls, or colloquially seagulls, are seabirds of the family Laridae in the suborder Lari. They are most closely related to the terns and skimmers and only distantly related to auks, and even more distantly to waders. Until the 21st century ...
s, other corvids, and
duck Duck is the common name for numerous species of waterfowl in the family Anatidae. Ducks are generally smaller and shorter-necked than swans and geese, which are members of the same family. Divided among several subfamilies, they are a form ...
s for food in parks and gardens. Like other species of corvid, carrion crows will actively harass predators and competitors that enter their territory or threaten them or their offspring, and will engage in group mobbing behaviour as a method to defend themselves.


Intelligence

Like all
corvids Corvidae is a cosmopolitan family of oscine passerine birds that contains the crows, ravens, rooks, jackdaws, jays, magpies, treepies, choughs, and nutcrackers. In colloquial English, they are known as the crow family or corvids. Currently, 13 ...
, carrion crows are very intelligent. For example, they can discriminate between numerosities up to 30, flexibly switch between rules, and recognise human and crow faces. Given the difference in brain architecture in crows compared to primates, these abilities suggest that their intelligence is realised as a product of
convergent evolution Convergent evolution is the independent evolution of similar features in species of different periods or epochs in time. Convergent evolution creates analogous structures that have similar form or function but were not present in the last com ...
.


Diet

Though an eater of carrion of all kinds, the carrion crow will eat
insect Insects (from Latin ') are pancrustacean hexapod invertebrates of the class Insecta. They are the largest group within the arthropod phylum. Insects have a chitinous exoskeleton, a three-part body ( head, thorax and abdomen), three ...
s,
earthworm An earthworm is a terrestrial invertebrate that belongs to the phylum Annelida. They exhibit a tube-within-a-tube body plan; they are externally segmented with corresponding internal segmentation; and they usually have setae on all segments. T ...
s, other
invertebrate Invertebrates are a paraphyletic group of animals that neither possess nor develop a vertebral column (commonly known as a ''backbone'' or ''spine''), derived from the notochord. This is a grouping including all animals apart from the chordate ...
s, grain, fruits, seeds, nuts, small mammals, amphibians,
fish Fish are aquatic, craniate, gill-bearing animals that lack limbs with digits. Included in this definition are the living hagfish, lampreys, and cartilaginous and bony fish as well as various extinct related groups. Approximately 95% of ...
, scraps and will also steal eggs. Crows are scavengers by nature, which is why they tend to frequent sites inhabited by
human Humans (''Homo sapiens'') are the most abundant and widespread species of primate, characterized by bipedalism and exceptional cognitive skills due to a large and complex brain. This has enabled the development of advanced tools, cultu ...
s in order to feed on their household waste. Crows will also harass
birds of prey Birds of prey or predatory birds, also known as raptors, are hypercarnivorous bird species that actively hunt and feed on other vertebrates (mainly mammals, reptiles and other smaller birds). In addition to speed and strength, these predat ...
or even foxes for their kills. Crows actively hunt and occasionally co-operate with other crows to make kills, and are sometimes seen catching
duck Duck is the common name for numerous species of waterfowl in the family Anatidae. Ducks are generally smaller and shorter-necked than swans and geese, which are members of the same family. Divided among several subfamilies, they are a form ...
lings for food. Due to their gregarious lifestyle and defensive abilities, carrion crows have few natural predators. However, powerful raptors such as the northern goshawk, peregrine falcon,
Eurasian eagle-owl The Eurasian eagle-owl (''Bubo bubo'') is a species of eagle-owl that resides in much of Eurasia. It is also called the Uhu and it is occasionally abbreviated to just the eagle-owl in Europe. It is one of the largest species of owl, and femal ...
and
golden eagle The golden eagle (''Aquila chrysaetos'') is a bird of prey living in the Northern Hemisphere. It is the most widely distributed species of eagle. Like all eagles, it belongs to the family Accipitridae. They are one of the best-known birds of ...
will readily hunt them, and crows can become an important prey item locally.


Nesting

The bulky stick nest is usually placed in a tall tree, but cliff ledges, old buildings and pylons may be used as well. Nests are also occasionally placed on or near the ground. The nest resembles that of the
common raven The common raven (''Corvus corax'') is a large all-black passerine bird. It is the most widely distributed of all corvids, found across the Northern Hemisphere. It is a raven known by many names at the subspecies level; there are at least ...
, but is less bulky. The 3 to 4 brown-speckled blue or greenish eggs are incubated for 18–20 days by the female alone, who is fed by the male. The young fledge after 29–30 days.British Trust for Ornithology (2005) Nest Record Scheme data
It is not uncommon for an offspring from the previous years to stay around and help rear the new hatchlings. Instead of seeking out a mate, it looks for food and assists the parents in feeding the young.


References


External links

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Photo of profile

Image of the skull

Ageing and sexing (PDF; 3.4 MB) by Javier Blasco-Zumeta & Gerd-Michael Heinze

HOME of the corvus corone corone
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carrion crow The carrion crow (''Corvus corone'') is a passerine bird of the family Corvidae and the genus ''Corvus'' which is native to western Europe and the eastern Palearctic. Taxonomy and systematics The carrion crow was one of the many species or ...
carrion crow The carrion crow (''Corvus corone'') is a passerine bird of the family Corvidae and the genus ''Corvus'' which is native to western Europe and the eastern Palearctic. Taxonomy and systematics The carrion crow was one of the many species or ...
Birds of Eurasia Birds of Japan
carrion crow The carrion crow (''Corvus corone'') is a passerine bird of the family Corvidae and the genus ''Corvus'' which is native to western Europe and the eastern Palearctic. Taxonomy and systematics The carrion crow was one of the many species or ...
carrion crow The carrion crow (''Corvus corone'') is a passerine bird of the family Corvidae and the genus ''Corvus'' which is native to western Europe and the eastern Palearctic. Taxonomy and systematics The carrion crow was one of the many species or ...