hi,    just wondered if anyone can throw some light on this.  while i was walking my dogs today i went passed a large house down a country lane, in the garden hanging from the branch of a tree, was a dead scarecrow,it was tied  with a piece of string round its neck then tied to a branch of the tree.  somewhere in the back of my mind, i seem to remember being told that farmers do this to ward of birds from eating there crops. dont know if this is true, but it was not a very nice thing to see, god nows why a private house would need to do this, he did have a vegi garden though. any way just wondered if anyone out there has heard of this.

jackie

It used to be that gamekeepers would have a "gibbet" where they would hang the magpies, crows, etc that they had shot - to show "the boss" that they were doing their work! - but that was before WWII!!!

Margot

Do you mean a dead crow?
(Confused at visions of a scarecrow being hanged - very occultish!)

yes!  a dead crow, going a bit manky to,

jackie

Have heard of it (and recently too) to scare off other crows from eating crops.  Nasty, dunno if it worked!

>(Confused at visions of a scarecrow being hanged - very occultish!)

me to JG, I would have been totally freaked to have seen a "dead scarecrow" hung up by its neck, but probably more freaked to have seen a "live" scarecrow :D

Lol! Echoes of Worzel Gummidge from my youth! :D :D

how do they kill the crows?

You quite often find the people who go around catching moles hang their bodies on a fence, I was told it was to scare the others away as the live ones can smell Death, don't know how true that is though.

*don't know how true that is though. *
Can`t be that much truth in it cos my lot hunt moles every day, have done since they were able & leave the ones they don`t eat lying around, never ever seems to scare the other moles away tho ;(
Just as well as keeps them happy & they get to have something to hunt for everyday ;) :)

Christine, Spain.

Crows: shot or larsoned crows are hung up for two reasons....firstly to act as a warning to other crows (this works for ltd period until the magpies eat the carcass!!)
and secondly...mainly applies to moles...to show the land owner how much vermin you are killing so you can get paid per head.

I think quite alot of people still do it, both my aunties do on their farms, used to scare me to death as a kid, they would kind of mummify after a while. Really gruesome.

Sarah

It is pretty gruesome - I haven't seen any for ages, but used to see all sorts hung up on country walks in my childhood.
(Must say, I was expecting a question about blackbirds, as in the song bird!!)

Lindsay
X

:d  When I first read it I thought, scarecrows aren't a living being anyway except for Worzel :d :d  Oooh, yuck, didn't know that they did this to crows !

Sorry about the name "scarecrow" Blackbirds, Crows, its what we used to call them when we were kids, "showing my age"
Jackie

I think a blackbird is a completely different thing to a crow?

You're right, Ana, blackbirds are a different species to crows, which are a different species to rooks, which are a different species to jackdaws. But all are 'black' birds.
:)