Yagi at Rite-Aid

We were on crow duty today, meaning that after sunset we head to the University Mall at Russell and Anderson, turn on the radio, and see how many of the crows are in place roosting in the parking trees, endangering cars and passerbys below. Not that we needed it for checking at the mall, I played with the yagi for the first time. We parked across the street at Rite-Aid, since Pica had to run inside to pick up some stuff. A few observations: the yagi has lots of poky bits. Watch out for pedestrians before you do 360-degree twirlings. The mulched area between the sidewalk and the parking lot proved to be a good spot to turn around in. Second, don’t hold the antenna by the handle, but grasp it in the middle. Your wrist will be happier for it. Finally, be glad you don’t have to visually track down every crow (11 so far). That would take a while.

All crows were accounted for, including our friend 594, who was near our house this morning. But a couple weren’t at the mall, but were flying somewhere else. In particular Crow 113 was somewhere to the south. Since our route home took us that way we stopped about a third of a mile south and checked again. This time the strongest signal was to the west, towards the nearby dorms. We figured 113 was off on a balcony partaking of a keg or two.