The “Hello” Crow

My wife finally got a little movie of the “hello” crow back in March. She was inside our home shooting this video and the sound is really muffled. The video clip starts off with it just finishing a “hello” call as it sits perched above the suet block in our backyard. Soon you can hear some small birds that are really close on the feeder by the window (they chirp sharply 2 times at about 5 and 6 seconds into the video). Listen very closely after that and watch the crow do its “hello” call again 3 times (its beak is closed but its head bobs 7 - 10 seconds into the video). It then caws a normal 8 caws with its beak open and a starling flies up to it at the end of the video.

The Hello Crow

As I woke up this morning, Terri told me that the “hello crow” was back. There were at least five crows in the trees and on the ground near our bird feeder and suet, and though we couldn’t ID which crow it was that was vocalizing, we could hear it quite clearly. This crow, or one that has also picked up on the vocalizations, has been in the area for at least 16 years. I Googled “crow that says hello” and came across this YouTube video of a Hello Crow, perhaps it is the same one that visits us in central PA.