Spring 2024 Crow Saga – Part 6

April 22, 2024April 16, 2024 / The Urban Nature Enthusiast / 4 Comments

NORMAN AND NANCY’S TRYING TIMES

Poor Norman and Nancy are having a bit of a frustrating nesting season so far, working on their third nest so far.

Norman, hard at work at the beginning of April

The first nest, in one of the coveted red-leaved plum trees, disappeared without a trace overnight, so I suspect that humans, less excited than I would be to have a crow’s nest in front of the house, dismantled it.

Undaunted, they build again, this time in a large holly bush. It was very well hidden there — I only noticed what they were up to because Geordie was staring at the tree intently, convinced it harboured a raccoon.

That seemed like an excellent location, but they seem to have abandoned it — perhaps there really was a raccoon in there! They’re now working on nest no. 3 in another red-leaved plum tree across the street from us.

The new nest, containing bits of the weeping birch next door.

Norman, selecting furniture

Unfortunately, this new spot seems very exposed and I have a feeling that they still haven’t found that perfect location yet. We’re leaving for our trip tomorrow, so I’ll just have to see where they finally settle.

Norman and Nancy remain in contention with Marvin, Mavis and Lucky regarding “ownership” of our back yard. As the opposing team have the numerical advantage, so Norman and Nancy often have to concede, but keep coming back.

Tomorrow’s last instalment of the Spring 2024 Crow Chronicles will be a Marvin, Mavis and Lucky update.

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Spring 2024 Crow Sagas Part 5

April 21, 2024April 16, 2024 / The Urban Nature Enthusiast / Leave a comment

BONGO AND BELLA’S EARLY START

Bongo and Bella seem to be on their own now as Brunhilde, their fledling from 2023, hasn’t been seen for a few weeks now. I think she may have been trying to get Bongo to mate with her, at which point Bella put her clawed foot down and insisted it was time for her to go hang out with crows her own age.

All is proceeding according to plan now, and Bella has been sitting on the nest for about ten days now, making her and Bongo first among this spring’s local crow nesters.

The red-leaved plum trees make good camouflage for early nests. Unfortunately these trees are getting to be rare real estate as, all planted at the same time, most are reaching the end-of-life stage at once and are either falling over or being pre-emptively removed by City crews.

Bongo is on constant guard close to the nest.

He guards in all weather …

He’s started his mating season “boing” calls too.

I tried to get a video of him doing it but, as always, it’s noisy! In this case he’s competing with Geordie’s excitable dog friend, Sally …

Tomorrow: Norman and Nancy’s Nesting Trials

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Risqué Ravens

March 13, 2024March 12, 2024 / The Urban Nature Enthusiast / 5 Comments

Well, you just never know what you might see up on the mountain!

You may remember that I wrote last month about seeing a raven pair devoted to pre-nesting behaviour, with lots of beak play and mutual preening of feathers. I think we saw a different pair on this most recent trip (the male had an oval- shaped eye on one side) — but they were engaged in the same activities.

This female raven was also doing her best fledgling-begging-to-be-fed impression in order to solidly fix in her mate’s brain his future role as sole breadwinner (and bringer) when she’s stuck in the nest on egg-incubation duty.

They did the little “feed me” dance when several times.

The female, it seemed, was sufficiently impressed and convinced of her partner’s proficiency in this matter, because …

*** WARNING: R-Rated Raven Content Ahead ***

After one feeding ritual she bowed down, wiggled her tail and — well — Nature took it’s course!

I really couldn’t believe my luck to have witness this moment! In fifteen years of watching crows in my own neighbourhood, I’ve never seen them actually mating and never expected to see this briefest of brief interactions between a raven couple.

Having seen the female raven’s rumpled feathers right after “the act,” I now find myself looking rather knowingly at my local crows whenever I see one of them in a similarly unkempt state.

Female raven “en deshabille”

The male raven continued to preen and groom his mate because, of course, that ten second act was just the beginning of a long process that will test the trust and partnership between them for many weeks to come.

The loving raven couple with a sweeping view of Vancouver behind them

Our female raven is probably sitting on some newly-laid eggs right now and her well-trained mate is keeping her fed. Two to three weeks of incubating the eggs, and then both raven parents will share the work of keeping the hatchlings fed, guarded and clean, and Mom will be able to get out and about and feel the rush of wind under her wings again.

I’ve no idea where their nest is. As you can see in the video below, it could be almost anywhere!