They are similarly colored to their raven cousins and come in either pale blue or green colors or a somewhat darker olive green shade.Ĭuckoos and koels are brood parasites that often lay eggs in a crow’s nest and lay them there for the mother crow to incubate them. The eggs are smaller, about 1.4 to 1.9 inches long and 1 – 1.2 inches wide. They incubate their eggs for 16-18 days, and then the hatchlings take another 20-40 days to fledge.Ĭrows can have up to 2 broods in one mating season, while ravens only have one clutch.

Both the parents provide food and water to the chicks through regurgitation.Īmerican crows start mating in mid to late March. The chicks hatch in an altricial state they have no feathers and are completely blind and helpless. While the female raven incubates the eggs, the male is responsible for providing food. They can come in many colors: blue, green, dark green, purple, brown, or olive. The eggs themselves are between 1.7 to 2 inches long and 1.2 to 1.4 inches wide. They have the longest incubation and nesting periods among the three, with the eggs needing about 20 to 25 days to hatch and then another 28 to 50 days to fledge. Ravens start mating in mid-February and go on breeding till the end of May. Mating cycles are not easy to observe, but if you are a regular bird watcher and are observing a bird over some time, the mating cycle is the easiest way to differentiate these three types of birds. Ravens tend to have a croaking quality to their call, while crows make the famous “caw” sound when calling out to other crows. While ravens and crows are cacophonous, blackbirds’ calls are much more melodious.īetween ravens and crows, you have to listen very carefully. Perhaps the easiest way to distinguish between these birds is their typical call. The raven also has a feathery bush under the beak, which flares out when in danger. Their bills look somewhat like a needle from a distance.Īnother difference is that both crows and ravens have a bit of bristle around their beaks, but blackbirds don’t have anything. Their bills are completely straight and very pointed and slender. Moreover, American crows have bills that are less wide than that of ravens.īlackbirds have slender beaks with no noticeable hooking at the top. The raven has a rather wide beak that is decidedly hooked at the top.Īmerican crows also have a hooked bill, but the hook is not that prominent. The most easily distinguishable feature between these birds is their bills. This is due to the proteins melanin and keratin in their wings, and the way light reflects itself off of them.Īmerican crows are not glossy black, but they do give off a violet-colored hue when you see them from the right perspective. Ravens are glossy black, and they also give out an iridescence in the colors blue, green, or purple. Other types of blackbirds don’t have these colors, so they are harder to identify, but you can always pick out a blackbird due to its smaller size.īetween crows and ravens, the key difference is the glossiness of the black color. Red-winged blackbirds have, as the name suggests, a yellow and red colored band where the wings bend. But if you look closer, there are marked differences. Perhaps the most confusing attribute of these three birds is the color. If you put two pencils on top of each other, they would be about 15 inches long. At its maximum, that’s about 5 feet, not much smaller than the average male adult in America (who is about 5’11”)Īmerican crows have a wingspan somewhere between 33 to 39 inches, which is about the size of ten popsicle sticks kept next to each other.īlackbirds are the smallest, with wings that are between 13 to 15 inches wide. The raven has a huge wingspan of 39 to 59 inches.

Raven wingspan