During the holidays, I posted one of my favourite raven videos for twelve days in a row on my social media pages. I planned to post them daily here as well, but as all the family festivities started to gather steam, I ran out of raven-time.

So here, with apologies, are your belated ravens.

Those who’ve followed the blog for a while will have seen some of these before, but I’m putting this collection together with the thought of you sitting at home with your feet up and a cup or glass or something nice at hand, enjoying them one after another.

Hint: I’m told that some cats also get a kick out of the sounds in these videos!

1.  Goofy Ravens in the Snow

My most popular video, viewed so many times I just stopped keeping track.

What we have here is a pair of ravens (part of a bigger group) playing and snow bathing on a foggy day on Mount Seymour a couple of years ago …

 

2.  Raven Makes The Knocking Call

A video taken last winter of a raven making that magical knocking call that sounds like a perfectly tuned hollow wooden instrument of some sort. You can see the raven’s breath as he or she propels the call into the chilly mountain air.

 

3. Raven Pair in Conversation

This is one of several videos I’ve shot (the cats will love this one) of raven couples having a bit of a domestic chat. In this case, the raven on the right has eyebrows raised as I often see when ravens are interacting. Obviously it means something, but I’m not sure what. The beak play is a sign of affection.

 

4. Raven Photobomber

As I spend countless (often fruitless) hours looking for ravens on our hikes, it was quite the unexpected bonus to have my video of a snowy rivulet photobombed by this handsome visitor.

 

5. Construction Site Raven

You don’t always have to be in the mountains to spy a raven! This video shows one at the end of our street enjoying some construction worker’s left over lunch orange at the huge building site we had here in 2020. The raven is happily oblivious to the massive machinery all around, not to mention the scolding of the local crows.

6. Raven Family Interaction

This video is from about 2018 and shows a group of three ravens. I get the impression that they’re a family just because their interaction reminds me so much the teenage years at our house. “Stop mucking about. Pick up your socks. Do your homework. Etc.”

7. Raven Recitation

This is also an older video, showing one of the ravens that used to frequent our neighbourhood before the big trees came down in 2020. The very deliberate series of calls, each one so carefully enunciated, really reminds me of a corvid poetry reading.

8. Raven, Eagle and Crows

Shot with my phone across several lanes of truck traffic, this video grainily captures a moment of raven determination and  nerve.

The crows were already assembled and harassing a juvenile bald eagle in the tree. The eagle was eating something and the raven who next arrived clearly had a plan to get that snack. With little hesitation the raven hopped up the tree to just below the eagle.

There the raven stopped for about half a minute — perhaps reconsidering the risky plan, or just waiting for the perfect moment — before grabbing the eagles tail and forcibly yanking the much bigger bird right out of the tree.

The startled eagle took off, pursued by gleeful crows — leaving the raven to the dropped prize.

9. Raven Knocking Call Two

Another video of that lovely “temple bell” raven call. This time the raven is facing the camera, so you can see how the throat feathers fan out as they make the sound.

10. Raven Says Ho Ho! Ho!

This raven, filmed the week before Christmas this year, seems to be saying “Ha! Ha! Ha!” which I was sure, when looking at it later, must be corvid for “Ho! Ho! Ho!”

Or it could just be that I’d been drinking too much eggnog at that point …

11. Ravens Playing With Snowballs Part One

One of my all-time favourites — ravens playing like puppies over a chunk of snow. Mount Seymour, 2019.

12. Ravens Playing With Snowballs Part Two

More of the same ravens wrestling and teasing over the same snowball …

 

I hope you’ve enjoyed this little series of favourites.

If you want to spend a whole evening watching ravens, plus crows making sounds like dogs, cats and backing up trucks and more, you can check out my YouTube channel.

Stay tuned for more local and crow and raven and general urban nature news in the coming days.

 

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