The Van Buren press., 1896-12-12
A SLAUGHTER OF CROWS.
rhey Were Cunning, But Glossonberry Ex-

John Glossoberry, an elderly farmer
living in a rocky vale near Northfield,
Conn, in the watershed of the Butter
nut brook, which flows into the Water
bury reservoir, long deemed himself
able to cope with almost all Of the diff
euIties which best the life of Con-
neetieut agrieuIturist, but lately he has
been forced to confess that a flock of
crows on his premises proved too smart
About u mile from Glossonberry
wood-eelored farmhouse in a good-sized
tract of handsome pine trees that for
years sheltered an increasing flock of
crows For more than year this flock
WAS a menace to his grain, his gardens.
and finally to his poultry yard So nu-
merous and bold had the crows become
last summer that they not only robbed
his hens and turkeys of their eggs, but
also distracted the attention of the
brood hens and stole small chickens.
Three or four crows would attack hen
and her brood and in a day or two carry
off all but the mother.
As soon as he finished his husking
| Glossanberry took his shotgun from
| the hooks over his front door, and SAL
led forth to the crow roost in the pine
woods with the avowed intention of
waging a war of determination upon
| the crows. He got one shot at them
and brought down single bird. The
rest of them rose in a cawing, angry
cloud, and Glossonberry could not get
| the cunning marauders within range
again. Glossonherry is a fair shot, but
he found to his ehagrin that it was
practically impossible to reduce the
number of the wary creatures with his
gun. They would circle all about him
the instant his gun was discharged,
screaming as if in contempt, but always
just out of reach.
He at length gave up his desultory
warfare, and undertook to outwit the
crows by setting a trawi-a long line
to which several lateral lines, each with
hook, were tied The hooks on the
crow trawl were very small. and each
was baited with a single kernel of corn,
so carefully put on that it seemed inn
possible that the kernel could be taken
up without the hooks being swallowed.
He set the trawl in his corn field, which
bad been the scene of many depreda-
TONS He covered the cord with dry
earth. leaving nothing exposed except
the bait. Then he scattered corn
around to make the bait look natural.
The crows paid their customary chat
tering visit to the corn field in the aft
erneen. and futtered about in great
glee. finally going away without leav-
ing single unfortunate hooked. Upon
visiting the snare Glossonherry found
the corn all gone, even the hooks hav-
ing been stripped clean, and he was not
long in making up his mind that some
other artifce must be used before he
could hope to catch crows.
His next move was to go into the
woods and capture alive large screech
owl This he took home to use as a de-
coy. He knew, as every farmers boy
in these parts knows, that the owl is
one of the few enemies which the crow
has much reason to dread. The owl
robs the crows nests of their young
whenever possible, and when a crow dis
covers an owl blinking helplessly in the
glare of the sun 1t at once seeks re-
venge Glossonberry tied the owl to
| the limb of.an old tree in the corn field,
and speedily found, as he had hoped.
that the owl proved an irresistible mag
net to the crows. An advance guard
flew at the owl, screaming loudly and
calling apparently on all the crows
within hearing to attack the common
enemy The farmer ran at top speed
to the house of n neighbor TO get addi-
tional gunners to aid him in extermi-
mating the flock. The gunners came.
but his plans miscarried One of the
gunners, in his haste to kill Off the
birds, sighted one near the owl, and
killed off the decoy instead of its tor
mentor. That at once ended the sport.
Glossonberry could not find another
screech owl. but he at length hit upon
still another plan of warfare which
makes him to-day fairly well satisfied
man as far as killing crows is con-
cerned. After two weeks of work with
the box traps he caught two crows
alive. These he pinned on their backs
to the ground in an open feld near the
roost. They were held by their wings
between the pegs, yet not so closely as
TO prevent them from fluttering. Crows
are inquisitiye when they see other
crows in trouble and when Glossonber-
rvs crows saw the struggling captiyes
the whole lot flew about them. Clos
sonberry had thought the two crows
would prove as strong an attraction as
the owl had been, and he had his neigh
bors on hand, but the captive pair sur
prised him by serving his purpose
much better than had the owl The
captive crows tackled fercely the first
Of the flock that came near and held on
tenaciously. This brought on a full
Aedged crow riot and the whole flock
was soon in a fight. The air above the
spot was black with crows.
Glossonberry and his party waited
until the fight extended to the whole
flock and then they began blazing away
1t the birds. All the usual caution of
the birds seemed to be gone. The birds
continued the fight despite the APP
rroach of the men and the shots.
There were four gunners in the party.
and they used cartridges of coarse shot,
firing as rapidly as possible. When they
finished a remnant of the flock flew
away. leaving III dead and wounded on
the ground. The survivors have made
themselves scarce about Glossonberry's
farm ever since. His neighbors de-