Chap­ter 37 begins on a cold Sat­ur­day morn­ing at 6:45 A.M., with the nar­ra­tor stand­ing beside a frosty field, prepar­ing to inter­view hunters dressed in cam­ou­flage and armed with loaded guns. The tem­per­a­ture is a brisk 34 degrees, and as the chill bites at their skin, they reflect on the series of deci­sions that led them to this moment. The inter­view is cru­cial for their crow col­umn, which was sparked by an inquiry to Dr. Cor­nell, a bird expert. Dr. Cor­nell explains that anoth­er town had made unsuc­cess­ful attempts to man­age a crow pop­u­la­tion of approx­i­mate­ly fifty thou­sand, using spo­radic hunts. While the town’s res­i­dents hoped to con­trol the pop­u­la­tion, Dr. Cor­nell points out that such hunts are inef­fec­tive at sig­nif­i­cant­ly affect­ing the crows’ num­bers or their migra­tion pat­terns. This insight paints a grim pic­ture for the community’s efforts, sug­gest­ing that the approach is flawed and unlike­ly to bring last­ing results.

As the inter­view pro­gress­es, the nar­ra­tor learns of an alter­na­tive approach from a near­by town that turned its crow prob­lem into a pos­i­tive oppor­tu­ni­ty. Instead of resort­ing to hunt­ing, this town embraced its crow pop­u­la­tion by host­ing a fes­ti­val that cel­e­brates the birds, trans­form­ing a prob­lem into a tourist attrac­tion. This inno­v­a­tive strat­e­gy catch­es the narrator’s atten­tion, mak­ing them ques­tion the effi­ca­cy of the cur­rent approach and whether there might be a more com­pas­sion­ate, sus­tain­able solu­tion. The idea of cel­e­brat­ing the crows instead of hunt­ing them stirs curios­i­ty in the nar­ra­tor, who begins to won­der how oth­er towns might ben­e­fit from a sim­i­lar mind­set. By refram­ing the prob­lem in a new light, the town was able to both solve its issue and bring in eco­nom­ic ben­e­fits, sug­gest­ing that look­ing at prob­lems from a dif­fer­ent angle can often yield unex­pect­ed and cre­ative results.

Liam, who is present with the nar­ra­tor dur­ing the hunt, reveals that his father has expressed a desire for them to bond over hunt­ing, a tra­di­tion Liam does not feel con­nect­ed to. While he under­stands his father’s inten­tions, Liam admits he finds lit­tle enjoy­ment in the idea of hunt­ing crows, a species he has devel­oped a fond­ness for. This con­ver­sa­tion reveals a gen­er­a­tional gap between them, high­light­ing dif­fer­ing views on tra­di­tion­al prac­tices such as hunt­ing. Liam’s dis­com­fort with hunt­ing show­cas­es the shift in atti­tudes among younger gen­er­a­tions, who are increas­ing­ly ques­tion­ing the need for such prac­tices in mod­ern times. This insight into Liam’s per­spec­tive adds depth to the nar­ra­tive, illus­trat­ing how tra­di­tions are often inher­it­ed but not nec­es­sar­i­ly embraced by every indi­vid­ual, espe­cial­ly as per­son­al beliefs and val­ues evolve.

As the nar­ra­tor and Liam dis­cuss poten­tial inter­vie­wees at the hunt, the narrator’s thoughts drift to Joe and Juniper, who are also involved in the event. Anx­ious about Joe’s par­tic­i­pa­tion, the narrator’s unease grows, espe­cial­ly as they reflect on the dark­er aspects of the hunt. Liam notices the change in the narrator’s demeanor and offers a com­fort­ing ges­ture, but the nar­ra­tor deflects, insist­ing they are fine and that they don’t like guns. Despite the narrator’s attempt to hide their dis­com­fort, Liam’s con­cern only deep­ens, and he advis­es cau­tion as they part ways. This sub­tle moment of sup­port from Liam fur­ther illus­trates their grow­ing bond, but it also empha­sizes the narrator’s inter­nal con­flict and wari­ness sur­round­ing the hunt and its effects on both the birds and the peo­ple involved.

Despite the hunters’ gen­er­al dis­in­ter­est in the envi­ron­men­tal impact of their actions, they eager­ly engage with the nar­ra­tor, offer­ing infor­ma­tion and anec­dotes about the hunt. How­ev­er, the sound of gun­shots rings out, and the nar­ra­tor becomes increas­ing­ly unset­tled, long­ing for a dif­fer­ent out­come. They wish the town would shift towards a more pos­i­tive cel­e­bra­tion of the crows, akin to the fes­ti­val men­tioned ear­li­er. The nar­ra­tor imag­ines a world where the town embraces the crows, turn­ing the event into some­thing joy­ful and edu­ca­tion­al rather than grim and vio­lent. They long for a more mean­ing­ful exchange, where the efforts made by the com­mu­ni­ty could be direct­ed toward fos­ter­ing under­stand­ing and appre­ci­a­tion for the birds, rather than per­pet­u­at­ing a cycle of vio­lence. This reflec­tion cap­tures the narrator’s inner desire for change, high­light­ing their grow­ing belief that there are always alter­na­tive solu­tions to prob­lems, if only peo­ple are will­ing to shift their per­spec­tive.