The Birds

There is an eerie sound outside the Tracy Press office at night. Among the sounds of the cars passing by you hear the squawking of hundreds of crows roosting in the trees for the evening. You can just make out their outline in the evening sky as they circle above the trees looking for a place to land.

We had been meaning to grab some pictures of them around downtown so I aimed my camera at the nearest tree with an electronic flash attached to illuminate them in the dark. I found out something I never knew about crows. They hate electronic flashes.

With every picture I would take it looked as if the top third of the tree was exploding as crows flushed from their evening rest. They would wheel around for a few minutes then land and squawk until I hit them with the flash again.