Tina drags Bob along on a desperate quest to earn her bird-watching badge for the Thundergirls. Meanwhile, Louise and Gene try to keep their new restaurant game a secret from Linda.
Crows Encounters of the Trope Kind:
- The Bus Came Back: Ranger Matthew Dainko makes his first appearance since Season 6's "House of 1000 Bounces".
- Call-Back:
- Before he and Tina leave to go bird watching, Teddy asks Bob, "Aren't you kind of afraid of birds?", to which Bob replies that he's fine now that he knows they're not trying to kill him.
- Early on when Tina is venting her frustrations about only seeing crows and pigeons, she mentions that they did also see Bruce the Goose.
- When a restaurant customer says that potty training is hard, Teddy agrees. Teddy mentioned in "Turkey in a Can" that it took him seven years to get potty trained.
- Clever Crows: While hiding in the bathroom, Bob and Tina see a crow use a twig to dig for food inside a fallen log. Both of them find it fascinating, and even Ranger Dainko stops chasing them to stay and watch.
- Disgusting Public Toilet: The restroom Bob and Tina use to hide from Ranger Dainko is not well kept; the audience is spared the sight of the worst, but the dialogue makes it clear enough.
- Fugitive Arc: Downplayed; Bob and Tina spend the second half of the episode hiding from Ranger Dainko after they accidentally cause a broad-winged hawk to eat a dove.
- How the Mighty Have Fallen: The Exterminator Van, "How the Mitey Have Fallen", is a reference to the trope.
- Literal Metaphor: Ranger Dainko talks about how his fellow scouts never stopped to smell the roses. There was a patch for doing just that.
- Pop-Culture Pun Episode Title: The title is a reference to Close Encounters of the Third Kind.
- The Prankster: In order to alleviate boredom, Louise dares Gene to do things like putting a napkin on Teddy's shoulder without him noticing and asking one of the customers with a small child whether she has a diaper he could borrow. Linda calls both of them to the kitchen and tells them off on pranking customers, and asking why she wasn't included in doing dares, something she used to do a lot when she was younger, and Louise and Gene include her in the dares as well, although she only allows dares that won't make a mess and don't involve customers. Later, Louise thinks of a great dare for Linda that involves a customer, but she remains resolute in not wanting to be a part of it, at least until Louise double-dog-dares her to do it, and she agrees to take a customer's order with her back facing forward and being made out to look like her front, with her glasses worn backwards, a napkin with eyes drawn on it under it and more napkins stuffed under her shirt for her breasts.
- Recycled Premise: The episode feels like a very similar version of "House of 1000 Bounces" down to having Ranger Matthew Dainko return to it, only there's no party, and the bird B-plot with Bob being afraid of birds (which is also mentioned in this episode) is reworked to be the main plot as bird watching.
- Scout-Out: Ranger Dainko used to be part of a wilderness group.
- Shout-Out:
- The Store Next Door is "With a Little Hoop From My Friends".
- The Burger of the Day is the "Rye Here Rye Now Burger".
- After seeing a lot of crows, Bob makes a reference to the band Counting Crows. The end credits song is Tina sinigng a parody of "Mister Jones", only it's about a crow.
- When Bob and Tina get back to the restaurant, Gene asks them if they found out what it sounds like when the doves cry.
- What Have I Done: Tina when luring out birds with bread leads to a dove getting eaten by a hawk.
