Expert: Roger Lederer - 6/14/2010

Question
I sat on my deck this weekend and watched a crow and a hawk alternately chase each other up and down the street for over an hour.  They would fly into a tree in my back yard, sit there for a minute looking at each other, and then take off again.  Every time they did this they alternated who was the chaser and the chase.  It appeared that they were just playing with each other.  I thought these two hated each other and usually if you see one crow after a hawk he's got a bunch of other crows with him.  Do you think this was some sort of way of testing each other?

Answer
They are not playing or testing each other. The crow(s) chases the hawk to get it away from its territory or nesting area and the hawk is trying to defend itself by chasing the crow away. Occasionally the hawk will catch the crow and kill it. If the crow and hawk have nearby territories, this might happen quite often.