• Maria
      Participant
      Chirps: 1
      Grackles have a yellow ring around their eyes and their feathers are almost iridescent. Cow birds have brown heads.
    • Stephanie
      Participant
      Chirps: 1
      Crows (and ravens) have the tuft of feathers on top of their beak.  It is larger on the raven it seems.  Grackles have more of a long skinny tail.
    • Hope
      Participant
      Chirps: 2
      The eyes are different from the eyes of the grackles. Also the grackles bodies are slimmer.
    • Elisabeth
      Participant
      Chirps: 6
      I can often tell a crow by its cawing vs the ronking of ravens.   Crows can also be very melodious.
    • Louise
      Participant
      Chirps: 1
      Most of the other "blackbirds" have yellow eyes. You can sometimes count the five feathers in the crow's wing tip vs. four in the raven. The tip of the crow beak is smooth, that of others looks jagged.
    • Lisa
      Participant
      Chirps: 2
      Sometime it is difficult to see the 5 feathers and I also have difficulty when distinguishing them in large groups.
    • Shiny
      Participant
      Chirps: 7
      A crow seems to have a stouter bill and they are completely black compared to a grackle, their eye colors are also a hint.
    • Donna
      Participant
      Chirps: 1
      I feel fairly confident but seem to have a bit of trouble with the in flight identification. I think it may be the distance though.
    • Jane
      Participant
      Chirps: 2
      I find out ravens' tails r not always wedge shape (with a longer feather in the middle) somehow, which misleads me to think they r crows.
    • Raysee
      Participant
      Chirps: 1
      I live southeast, so we don't get any ravens, but I can usually tell crows from blackbirds from the eyes, the size, the tail, and sometimes the color if I'm up close.
    • Gracklefeeder1
      Participant
      Chirps: 5
      Check the eyes! We're loaded with Grackles so I can immediately spot the difference.
    • Dawn
      Participant
      Chirps: 25
      We have both ravens and crows where I live in Utah.  Ravens seem more likely to soar while crows have that typical "rowing" powered flight.  Also ravens more likely to be in the mountains.  They can occur at lower elevations too, but the crows mostly stick to the valleys and towns. Still get stumped sometimes at a distance if I can't get a good look at the tail shape.  The soaring of ravens is a good feature except in cold temperatures where they have to flap more (no thermals at 20 below zero).
      • Jenny
        Participant
        Chirps: 2
        Yes, these are all good ID comparisons/indicators I would agree with based on my observations mainly in Whitehorse, Yukon where American Crows have become more common (considered Rare when I first started birding here 25 years ago) in the last 15 years or so. Also, I have noted that the (growing) local population’s range has expanded from one primary locale to others - upriver islands in the Yukon River- within the City or recently a nearby subdivision, so that has been an ID aid.  I also use their “caws” to identify their presence and hope to learn more about those in the course. The Common Raven is our Territorial Bird so most people know it well; it is easy to note the size difference between American Crows and Common Ravens when they are flying together. Are there also differences in how the two species walk? I’ll look for that in the field and discussion of that here.  American Crows are sharing some of the the same key bird habitat with some blackbirds like Rusty Blackbirds, within the city’s river valley floor, and also intruding in similar areas used by Black-billed Magpies whose population has also grown here. So far in Yukon, the American Crow has not populated any other towns or cities.
    • Donna
      Participant
      Chirps: 2
      I live in the Pacific Northwest and found it interesting that some consider our crows to be a different species than the American Crow.  We moved here from the Midwest and I have always thought that the crows here are bigger than the ones I grew up with in Iowa.  Is that an accurate observation or just me not remembering correctly?
    • Donna
      Participant
      Chirps: 2
      When telling crows from grackles I find eye color is helpful.
    • Margot
      Participant
      Chirps: 2
      Bird shape.
    • Kurt
      Participant
      Chirps: 29
      Sometimes I think I get it, by beak size, or amount of feathers at the neck...then it turns out I was wrong! I need to keep looking at the beaks of crows and ravens to help distinguish!
    • I got it pretty well.  If you can see the eyes, anything but dark brown/blackish is not a crow another blackbird.  Sometimes I'm sure I can miss label ravens & crows.
    • Juliet
      Participant
      Chirps: 1
      So far so good between the tail feathers and the beaks.
    • crow landing a While my hearing is not great and clearly not good enough to differentiate between various songbirds, corvids are a group that allows me to use sound as a signal.   For crows and ravens, I often start scanning the skies when I hear their characteristic calls.  So, I know what/who to look for.  The same is true for magpies.  The jays often leave me wondering, as I look into trees and bushes to find to source of their very variable sounds.
    • Kathleen
      Participant
      Chirps: 5
      I don’t see any ravens from my home in the North Carolina piedmont, so it is not usually an issue.  I typically know I’m in raven territory when I hear the deep, guttural call.  Crows are around everyday!
    • Greg
      Participant
      Chirps: 2
      Crows and Ravens are always gonna be tough to tell apart, but I certainly have a lot more to go by to check while taking this course. The snap ID is an absolute blast ! I'll go back to those again and again. Of course, the ultimate learning is while we're outside watching these intelligent and interesting critters. I find crows and especially ravens to be absolutely remarkable and full of spirit. Nature has so much to offer, teach and bewilder us. And it just keeps giving!
    • Susan
      Participant
      Chirps: 2
      I've had the same crow family come by for six years, anywhere from 2-7 of them. I'm attuned to hearing them caw to let me know they are waiting. I can't tell them apart, but the original mother crow is missing a wing feather. Several of the others have white wing feathers or a touch of white feathers on their side.Crows X3
      • Patrick
        Participant
        Chirps: 1
        That is incredible! You are very fortunate to have been chosen by this family
    • Paulette
      Participant
      Chirps: 4
      I can tell each one in a minute by their calls. We had more Fish Crows where I lived only 2 miles from here. We are surrounded by ponds, rivers and numerous bodies of water including the Long Island Sound, The Hudson River, The Saw Mill River, The Bronx River and the Hutchinson River. It is exciting to see and hear the American Crow when they do come by and a real thrill to see the RAVEN. The ones I have seen were in pairs and took over the top peak of the Middle School.
    • james
      Participant
      Chirps: 7
      6B67485B-C1F0-4ACA-85E5-2EE49325D5FA i am confident i can identify them. They are my favourite animal of all. I have known this one for 3 years. I call him wingy because he has some irregular wing feathers on the right side. They dont affect his ability to fly (or ability to gobble up  cashews.).
    • Li
      Participant
      Chirps: 34
      I usually distinguish crows from other “blackbirds” by looking at the color of their eyes. But it's hard for me to tell which one is a crow when they're moving fast :(