My grandmother fed the crows every afternoon and I can remember their cries of anticipation as she walked out into the field with a pail full of scraps. After my grandmother’s death, it was many years before my mother began feeding her crows. But after she started she often remarked that she heard them say, “Oh here she comes!”  
 
Up until recently I didn’t know why my grandmother and mother had a penchant for crows – I wish I had asked. But my neighbor Rose in Maine has been feeding her crows for ten years, and a month ago when I learned that all of her crows had been shot by hunters on her own land, I was enraged by this injustice. Rose loved her crows; She was devastated.
 
First, I discussed the problem with Raven who was perched in a cottonwood tree outside my door. He listened intently to my plea for help while peering down at me with one beady eye.
 
Normally, I do not have crows around here so ten minutes later when a “murder of crows” appeared screaming over my head as I walked down to the river I knew the raven had passed on the message. I repeated the story to the screeching crows asking that they inform other crows in Rose’s neighborhood that she was in crow mourning. Would they consider asking others to visit her? I took their collective cries as a yes.
 
Returning to the house I was stunned to see another cluster of crows perched in one tree engaged in raucous conversation with at least 4 magpies that had joined them. The raven had been joined by its mate (A bevy of crows, two ravens and four magpies stayed around the house for 3 days).
 
Convinced that I had been heard, and that something would come of it, I immediately emailed Rose telling her not to give up, to keep leaving scraps outside, and to begin to “call” new crows into her yard. She was skeptical, but did as I asked. As a personal thank you I began to leave tasty tidbits for the crows, ravens, magpies around here. 
 
One week later Rose had seven new crows to feed, and as of this writing, crows continue to return! The skeptic will immediately counter the obvious with westernized logic: namely that the crows returned by coincidence, or because at my request, Rose continued to leave food out for them. There’s one major flaw in this thinking: Crows routinely demonstrate to researchers that once one of them has been killed the rest will avoid a favored feeding area for up to two years. “Something” intervened to reverse this normal crow behavior, allowing the crows to return, and I believe it had everything to do with interspecies communication.
 
Armed with the knowledge that birds and animals can communicate telepathically through space/time, I never doubted that help would come. If one understands as I do that telepathy is a biological survival strategy that allows animals to stay in touch when they are separated then it isn’t a stretch to believe that these crows communicated with their Maine relatives. (Please go to biologist/plant physicist/author Rupert Sheldrake’s site to learn more about the extensive research that has been done on telepathy in animals - https://www.sheldrake.org).
 


I think I just heard the cawing of a murder of crows…

As a young child I remember going to tree farms to choose the beloved Christmas tree of the year. The fragrant scent of balsam was the last gift the annual  tree gifted us with as her needles dried, turned brown and dropped. I always remember feeling so sad that the tree was left to die after lighting up the house with luminous white lights.
 
When I married and moved to Monhegan Island, ten miles off the cost of Maine, I cut down my own Christmas tree in the forest. Since we had no electricity the tree was festooned with candles and homemade ornaments – I can still recall how beautiful that first tree was, and after Christmas I couldn’t bare to throw it out so I made all kinds of bird treats and placed them on the tree outdoors, a tradition I continued until the day came when I couldn’t stand to cut one more tree to the ground…
 
At this point the first live tree, the Norfolk Island Pine, came to live with us. With a profound sense of relief flooding me, my new friend also became our Christmas tree, a tree that lived on long after the season ended. I didn’t miss the scent of balsam because I continued to go into the forest every year to tip boughs for at least three wreaths – one for outdoors, the other two to use in the house (proper tipping actually encourages new growth). I was astonished and delighted by the tree’s beautiful weeping branches and straight trunk, although I was a bit astounded at how fast she grew. I loved that tree and was also so grateful because she had solved the problem of tree slaughter for me.
 
When I first began celebrating the winter solstice after my children were in late adolescence, the tree complied quite happily. I still had my grandmother’s miniature white lights that always stayed cool when lit, so every year she continued to light up the night … I now understood because of my academic study of world mythology, that for me, this indoor tree embodied so much more than the season’s turning – She was the “Tree of Life.” No wonder I had such difficulty chopping down and throwing out trees, year after year.
 
When I moved from the coast to the western mountains of Maine that tree went with me. She was getting too big for me to lift, and I had to get help re –potting her. In the summer she loved being outdoors, although the first year I gave her a sunburn by accident. I discovered she preferred the north side of the house.
 
Divorced, with absentee adult children I continued to drape her with lights for each winter solstice until the year my grandmother’s lights stopped working. After that I stopped because I was afraid the new hot lights would stress the pine and burn her needles. Instead I placed small animals and birds amongst tree branches and hung crystals from her boughs.
 
Most exciting to me this year is that my Norfolk Island Pine (who is actually a small forest of trees that friend Iren gave me) has chosen to sprout new growth in the fall instead of last spring/summer. I can’t get over this lush winter growth spurt because like all trees the pine normally rests in low winter light. I have never had this happen before. The edges of my tree’s fronds are deep emerald green and bushy green sprouts top each tree in the miniature forest. My bond with her/them runs deep, like a great underground river of song. I mist her every morning, touch her fronds and talk to her. With long starry nights upon us I have ringed her base with lights as I celebrate the joy of loving all trees even as the trees outdoors slip into their winter sleep…
 
A few words about the natural history of this tree: