When the Raven Knocks

My title sounds a bit ominous, like Edgar Allen Poe’s doleful visitor tapping on a window, but have no fear. In my world, when the raven knocks, you should always answer!

As winter drags on down here in the city, only letterbox shaped views of the mountains are available most days, peeking out between the gunmetal clouds.

Those glimpses do serve to remind me that the mountains and the ravens are out there — and that I might get up to see them once a week or so. Many people head south for this gloomy part of the winter, but I’m always drawn to the snow rather than the sand.

Often we get up on the mountain and there’s only a matching letterbox view back out at the city through the same clouds …

… but every time it’s wonderful in some different way.

To hear a raven calling in the snow-hushed forest — that knock, knock, knock call, something between a tapping on hollow bamboo and water dropping into a still pool — that sound alone is worth getting out of bed early and stepping into long johns and winter woollies.

You can see the raven’s chilly morning breath in this video and, if you listen closely, hear a stream merrily running in the background.

We met this suave raven below in the forest on our last trip.  I like to think I “called” him or her. I have been practicing my raven calling, with mixed results. Usually they ignore me, but occasionally they do a U-turn in mid-flight, possibly to come see if something down below is dying and available for lunch.

But, back to the raven and the beautiful call.
Like a trained opera singer, the raven pours all kinds of skill and stamina into that effortless sounding “clock clock clock.”

Head thrown back for best possible vocal projection.

Nictitating membrane of the eye deployed, giving the impression that our performer is blocking out all distraction in order to produce the purest sound.

Throat expanded, presumably to make a hollow space from which to draw that echoing call. Magnificent feathery “cravat” sticking out in all directions.

Wings held out to the side and tail spread out — that horizontal line behind the raven is the tail, held out like a fan.

The virtuoso performance …

 

For more posts on the wonder of raven calls:

You might also enjoy:  Edgar Allen Poe and the Raven Mix-up

 

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© junehunterimages, 2023. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to junehunterimages with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

 

Going Viral in a Pandemic

Well it’s been quite the week since my last post.

The video of the ravens playing and rolling in snow, featured in Raven Therapy Part 2, was also posted on social media. I thought there were probably a few people out there, feeling stressed like me, who might enjoy losing themselves in raven fun for a few minutes.

It turned out there were a LOT of people who really, really needed to see ravens being goofy in the snow last week. The first indication that things were going bonkers was when I got an email from a company called Viral Hog, wanting to “rep” my video and see if it could bring in revenue. I decided against that, but I did end up being interviewed for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, and Vancouver is Awesome. (You can see the CBC TV interview here. It’s the whole news show and I don’t appear until about the 10:10 point but you can fast forward after the ads.) I’m told the video was also featured on the Weather Network. In weather obsessed Canada, that is truly making it to the big time.

I’m not too savvy with figuring out the statistics for my social media — I normally just post things I like and hope other people like them too. I did manage, however, to find a thing called Insights on my FB page and it showed that it’s “reach” had climbed from whatever humble number it normally hovers at, to 3.42 million. Now that’s almost scary!

If you’ve been waiting for a reply from me, I apologize as I’ve just lost track of the emails, comments and messages on all the different platforms. I’m gradually working my way through them, but I may never get back to everyone. I think things are beginning to settle down now. Phew.

I did manage to escape back up the mountains a couple of times amid all of this. There were, alas, no more playing ravens this week — but there was magic of many other varieties.

There were, for example, the impossibly cute Douglas squirrels darting about through the snowy landscape. I think they were feeding on seeds from cedar trees as we saw lots of those shaken from the trees and lying on top of the snow.

In the video below, a Douglas squirrel gives an energetic alarm call. I’m not sure what the emergency was, since they’re generally quite fearless around humans.

And a small squirrel drama in which the protagonist drops his seed, is confused and seems to blame me …

On another mountain trip, devoid of ravens, we were amply compensated by a Northern Pygmy Owl sighting.

Almost missed it as it’s just a tiny little dot on top of this tall tree on the right.

Far away as it was, it obligingly sat there for quite a while so I could use my long lens to get some photos of it …

The perfect little tree topper. I’m tempted to try and make one out of felt for next year’s Christmas tree!

The last time we went up the mountain, we reached the view point over Vancouver early in the morning— only to find someone there ahead of us. His presence may have explained the absence of ravens.

While the ravens (and the squirrels, ironically) were keeping a low profile, someone else was furious and not shy about letting everyone know. You can hear them in this video.

And here is our tiny protester …

Our little Norman the Nuthatch didn’t return to the garden this last winter, so every time I see one somewhere else I wonder if it’s him, living his best life out in the wide world.

Much, much smaller than a raven, but in their own minds, just as majestic!

Do not mess with this bird!

You would not want this bird to collide with any part of your body …

Another bird displeased by the eagle’s visit was this vociferous Steller’s Jay.

… and furthermore …

The literal blue bird of happiness

And so, no more viral raven videos this week — just the run-of-the-mill magic of finding all different kinds of amazing beauty.

You never know what it will be until you get there.

 

 

 

 

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© junehunterimages, 2021. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to junehunterimages with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Raven Games

I was worried that I wasn’t going to get well soon enough to go up on the mountains again this winter. Luckily, it’s been snowing like crazy up there (as well as in the city!) and I finally started to feel better earlier this week.

Yesterday we headed up to Mount Seymour for a short outing.

Nothing too ambitious,  just a nice stroll in the winter wonderland.

The silence in the snow-baffled woods … the traditional peanut butter sandwich at the Dog Mountain lookout … and fresh, fresh air, were all very therapeutic.

But he most joyful thing of all was seeing the ravens playing.

I’ve never seen them have fun with snowballs before, but conditions yesterday were extremely snowball friendly. In fact, I developed a ball of it under one of my feet at the end of our walk. I tried to knock it off with my walking pole, but it was so persistent that part of it was still stuck the underside of my boot when we got home. This snow just INSISTED on being made into snowballs, and the ravens were happy to oblige.

As you can see from the video below, they were quite committed to this game. They reminded me very much of puppies playing.

Gloating when you’ve got the snowball is an important part of the game.

If you lie on the snowball, that makes it hard for your opponent to get it, rather like rugby.

Flying away with the snowball is the final solution.

Let the good times roll!

Just to emphasize how puppy-like the ravens were, here are Geordie and Luke wrestling this morning.

Compare the fun and strategy to these two ravens …

 

In my trips to the mountains in the winter, I’ve seen the ravens playing in the snow many times — rolling in it, playing with found objects — but I’ve never seen them having so much fun with snowballs. It wasn’t just this one pair either — I could see other groups further away engaged in the same game.

A few minutes later they all flew away to pursue other winter pastimes, so I felt very lucky to have watched this, and keen to share the fun with you!

More raven stories, photographs and video:

Raven Tutor

Learning to Speak Raven

Special Days (with ravens and mountain bluebirds)

Ghost Raven