Thank you for reading my blog today. I hope you are having a really good day.
Katie, GrandDad and I were hiking one day when we came out of the pine trees to the edge of Farmer Early's corn field. He had just recently harvested his corn with a really big machine that went back and forth over the field scrapping the corn husks off their stalks, and throwing them into a big wagon that was towed behind the machine. As a result of all the picking, pulling and throwing of the corn, some of it ended up on the ground as the wagon passed by.
GrandDad said that in the olden days poor people were allowed to come into the field after the harvest, and collect this corn from the ground to take home for themselves and their family. They called that corn "gleanings". I guess that's like some of the vegetables we get from farmer Early's garden.
But this day it wasn't poor people out in the field. It was crows. Lots and lots of crows. And they were jabbering away at each other as they pecked at the corn. That is, all but two crows that were up in a tall pine tree watching all the others feeding below. Katie said that maybe they just weren't hungry. But GrandDad said no, they were guards watching out for trouble. He said crows have a very good communication system. He said they have almost 50 different things they say that have a specific meaning to each other. When the guards saw trouble coming, they were supposed to call out a warning to the crows in the field.
But all of a sudden a few of the crows in the field started making a terrible racket, which caused the whole flock to lift off the ground at about the same time. Looking at the place where the ruckus started, we saw a fox running around trying to catch a crow. Because of the warning, he was unsuccessful, as all of the crows were able to fly to safety.
"Now look what the crows are going to do", GrandDad said to us. So Katie and I looked up to follow the flock of crows, and were we surprised. They all flew directly at the two crows in the tall pine tree who were supposed to be the guards, and they attacked them. The two crows tried to fly away, but the other crows flew at them using their sharp talons to cut and slash them; and using their beaks to peck at them viciously. Soon the two guards fell to the ground, and the rest of the flock flew away.
We asked GrandDad what that was all about, and he said that the flock was mad at the two guards because they did not do their job. They were supposed to watch out for predator and warn the crows on the ground, and they didn't do it. They must have been asleep, as the warning came from a few crows on the ground, and not from the guards in the tree.
Wow. I guess sometimes when we are given a responsibility, we had better be careful that we do what we are supposed to do, or someone could get hurt, and that someone might even be us.
Keep your chin up.
Robert P. Rabbit