# Do crows or ravens eat newborn lambs' eyes? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [January 5, 2011, 1:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-crows-or-ravens-eat-newborn-lambs-eyes/566439 "2011-01-05T01:41:45Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [January 5, 2011, 1:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-crows-or-ravens-eat-newborn-lambs-eyes/566439/1 "2011-01-05T01:41:45Z")
ISTR a thread about that earlier, but I can’t find it anywhere. In any event, I’m listening to the audiobook of David Sedaris’s short-story collection _Squirrel Seeks Chipmunk_, and in the story “The Crow and the Lamb,” he has a devious crow do just that. ---
**Author:** ![Musicat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/musicat/32/20189_2.png) [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)\ **Post date:** [January 5, 2011, 1:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-crows-or-ravens-eat-newborn-lambs-eyes/566439/2 "2011-01-05T01:43:07Z")
Eyes are tasty to scavengers and easily pluckable. What is there to question? ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [January 5, 2011, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-crows-or-ravens-eat-newborn-lambs-eyes/566439/3 "2011-01-05T01:52:51Z")
They are especially attractive when served on a bed of romaine and drizzled with aioli. ---
**Author:** ![Avumede](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/avumede/32/7235_2.png) [@Avumede](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Avumede)\ **Post date:** [January 5, 2011, 1:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-crows-or-ravens-eat-newborn-lambs-eyes/566439/4 "2011-01-05T01:54:12Z")
What prevents the newborn lambs from closing their eyes? Or is that not enough to stop eyes from being plucked out? Why couldn’t this happen to adult lambs, cows, etc? ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [January 5, 2011, 4:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-crows-or-ravens-eat-newborn-lambs-eyes/566439/5 "2011-01-05T04:38:08Z")
> [@Avumede](#): > > What prevents the newborn lambs from closing their eyes? Or is that not enough to stop eyes from being plucked out? Why couldn’t this happen to adult lambs, cows, etc? Closing their eyes wouldn’t offer much of a defense at all. Lambs, like most baby animals, are weaker and less able to defend themselves than adults. I’m not sure how common this is, but I wouldn’t have much doubt that a raven at least could and would do it if so inclined. ---
**Author:** ![Blake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a9a28c/32.png) [@Blake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blake)\ **Post date:** [January 5, 2011, 5:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-crows-or-ravens-eat-newborn-lambs-eyes/566439/6 "2011-01-05T05:26:28Z")
[Previous thread.](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=524091) ---
**Author:** ![Freudian\_Slit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/5daacb/32.png) [@Freudian\_Slit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freudian_Slit)\ **Post date:** [January 5, 2011, 5:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-crows-or-ravens-eat-newborn-lambs-eyes/566439/7 "2011-01-05T05:28:02Z")
Wait, they do this when the lambs are still alive? I assumed they found a dead lamb and did it. ---
**Author:** ![penultima\_thule](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/penultima_thule/32/3833_2.png) [@penultima\_thule](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/penultima_thule)\ **Post date:** [January 5, 2011, 6:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-crows-or-ravens-eat-newborn-lambs-eyes/566439/8 "2011-01-05T06:12:17Z")
Crows are quite capable of taking out the eye of a live, adult sheep. Apart from during birth it most commonly happens when the animal gets cast … i.e. it lies down and gets rolled onto it’s back or side and can’t stand up again, say it’s in a small hollow. Much less common with cattle as 1. they are much larger/stronger and 2. they don’t have a fleece which can be a significant hinderance to rolling back upright. Can also occur as a corollary of metabolic disorders like hypoglycemia (aka pregnancy toximia), hypocalcemia (aka milk fever) and hypomagnesemia (aka grass tetany) or low blood glucose, calcium & magnesium respectively and the animal is unable to stand. As the animals weaken, the crows will move in. I’d suspect that out in the rangelands a large proportion of animals with fatal diseases would lose an eye to the crows before they actually died. The difference in the cases above is that if found in time and the cast animal uprighted or the mineral disorder treated they can make a full recovery, sans eye. ---
**Author:** ![Blake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a9a28c/32.png) [@Blake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blake)\ **Post date:** [January 5, 2011, 6:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-crows-or-ravens-eat-newborn-lambs-eyes/566439/9 "2011-01-05T06:19:20Z")
Crows are also a major problem with cattle during droughts. Animals wander into river and dam beds looking for water, and get stuck in the mud. Crows then relieve them of their eyes. while they are perfectly healthy and alert. ---
**Author:** ![penultima\_thule](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/penultima_thule/32/3833_2.png) [@penultima\_thule](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/penultima_thule)\ **Post date:** [January 5, 2011, 6:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-crows-or-ravens-eat-newborn-lambs-eyes/566439/10 "2011-01-05T06:25:24Z")
“while they are perfectly healthy and alert” Well, thirsty and/or starving, but your point is correct. ---
**Author:** ![Blake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a9a28c/32.png) [@Blake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blake)\ **Post date:** [January 5, 2011, 6:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-crows-or-ravens-eat-newborn-lambs-eyes/566439/11 "2011-01-05T06:33:17Z")
> [@penultima\_thule](#): > > “while they are perfectly healthy and alert” > Well, thirsty and/or starving, but your point is correct. Being thirsty doesn’t make an animal less than perfectly healthy and alert. And in many droughts animals aren’t starving. There is a shortage of rain, not of feed. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [January 5, 2011, 2:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-crows-or-ravens-eat-newborn-lambs-eyes/566439/12 "2011-01-05T14:40:22Z")
> [@Blake](#): > > [Previous thread.](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=524091) Thanks. I’d forgotten it was another David Sedaris story that got the ball rolling last time - rather odd, that. ---
**Author:** ![Autolycus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/22d042/32.png) [@Autolycus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Autolycus)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2011, 3:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-crows-or-ravens-eat-newborn-lambs-eyes/566439/13 "2011-01-06T03:50:03Z")
Well, this thread certainly has been eye-opening! ---
**Author:** ![psychonaut](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/psychonaut/32/4655_2.png) [@psychonaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/psychonaut)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2011, 1:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-crows-or-ravens-eat-newborn-lambs-eyes/566439/14 "2011-01-06T13:34:07Z")
> [@Avumede](#): > > What prevents the newborn lambs from closing their eyes? Or is that not enough to stop eyes from being plucked out? Why couldn’t this happen to adult lambs, cows, etc? This can’t happen to adult lambs because there are no adult lambs. ---
**Author:** ![Floater](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/dc4da7/32.png) [@Floater](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Floater)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2011, 11:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-crows-or-ravens-eat-newborn-lambs-eyes/566439/15 "2011-01-07T11:03:40Z")
> [@psychonaut](#): > > This can’t happen to adult lambs because there are no adult lambs. Tell that to the inhabitants of the island of Gotland in the Baltic sea. All sheep are called lamb in the local dialect.