Taking lessons from an American Crow seems rather far-fetched. Yet, I realize more and more that it is quite possible to be a pupil of a bird. I have begun to try to imitate the crow calls in the very sight of the birds to see their reaction. Many times they give me a wary eye and fly off, but at times they will repeat their sounds and wait for me to imitate them. The lessons can be long and tedious, and often I can not reproduce the taught sounds afterwards. Usually, these lessons are widely spaced in time, and rare, as well as being supervised with a separate teacher each class. But once, a breeding pair came and made their nest high up in a tree by our house, and the seemingly irresponsible male ( I am quite sure he was male, for the female was far more frightened of me) condescended to drill me through my crow language paces. It began when I saw him in the green space behind our yard, dipping his head and lifting his wings to let out a hollow “cow, cow” noise. Since he was in a  perfect location for a lesson, I paced carefully through the blooming garden and stopped near him, and repeated the noise as best I could.   The tone was difficult to replicate exactly, and thankfully my teacher did not fly away, but gazed upon me with a questioning countenance. Then, when my recitation was over, he slowly turned from me, and again gave the call, and watched me as I repeated. Some sounds were low, some were high, some short, some long, but always the same monosyllable of “cow, cow”. But he evidently wanted to know more of my abilities and gives a bill rattle crossed with a regular caw. Now, that was too difficult, and after a while he returned to the spotted bovine nomenclature, and even asked for a few caws, all the while scrutinizing me as I learned my lessons, and waiting for me to finish before beginning the next assignment. He even took some food in his bill and went to a tree nearer and adjacent to me where he continued the lesson between eating. Finally, when I was growing tired of the lesson, and was contemplating deserting the green, leafy schoolroom, he shot into the air with caws that sounded rather amused and flew away. I think he was telling all the world about his role as teacher. Poor thing. Yes, poor thing, for I believe he needed to be taught a thing or two himself, for when his mate was incubating eggs, he hardly fed her more than twice a day and would not respond to her calls. Perhaps he was too far away, but his mate became quite distressed during his absence. He seemed to come less and less, and finally, when their nest eggs failed to hatch, rarely made his appearance. Now, his mate is mostly on her own, eating the scraps we give her and hovering about  the nest. Well, perhaps they could try making a new one, for they have yet time.

American Crow
Corvus brachyrhynchos

This bird is quite intelligent, in fact, one of the most intelligent birds science knows. They rarely glide, unlike the Common Raven, and have shorter wings and squarer tails. They are songbirds, these American Crows, though they do not sing. They are classified as such not because of song but because of their blood relation to other birds. They roost in the evenings outside of breeding season in great throngs called aggregations or murders.