What is a group of crows called?
A group of crows is traditionally called a murder. The name comes from old English hunting terms and folklore linking crows with death, not from their behavior.
Many colorful collective nouns for animals date from the late Middle Ages, when books listed fanciful terms for groups. A murder of crows appears in sources from the 1400s. Other examples include a parliament of owls, an exaltation of larks and a pride of lions.
Crows sometimes gather in huge winter roosts of thousands of birds. They are very intelligent: they use tools, solve puzzles and can recognize individual human faces.
Crows and ravens
Ravens are larger relatives of crows with thicker beaks and wedge-shaped tails. A group of ravens is sometimes called an unkindness or a conspiracy. In everyday speech, though, scientists simply call these groups flocks.
Crows live almost everywhere, from farmland to busy cities, and they adapt well to people. Some city crows drop nuts onto roads so passing cars crack them open, then wait for the traffic light to change before picking up the pieces. Young crows often stay with their parents for a year or more and help raise the next brood.
Did You Know?
Studies in Seattle found that crows remembered the faces of researchers who had trapped them for years and scolded them when they saw them.