Vancouver crows

Summer’s End

/ The Urban Nature Enthusiast / 8 Comments

Never mind the calendar, all that equinox stuff, and the availability or otherwise of pumpkin-spiced lattes: the local crows have decided that fall started this morning.

I could tell things had changed as soon as I left the house. While the leaves are turning colour a bit, and it is noticeably chillier, the change in crow behaviour is the real sign of the seasons turning.

Crow air traffic controllers have taken the day off.

Normally boundary-sensitive crows are trespassing on each others’ turf with abandon.

Large groups of crows gather in trees, cawing madly; not the “look out, it’s an eagle/raven/raccoon” -type cawing but the riotous joie de vivre cawing of the autumn crow.

Crows compete with squirrels for newly fallen nuts.

They chase each other and tumble in the air just for fun.

I’m followed by a crowd of unruly crows, with the boldest brushing past an inch from my head and making the dog nervous.

Definitely fall!

I write about this phenomenon, the rowdy, rollicking, freedom-from-fledglings social season, almost every year. Although most of the crows are still suffering the itchiness and indignity of moulting season, it’s a joyful, somewhat lawless time of year in Crowlandia. The crows even look like pirates!

The parents are finally (mostly) free from the ceaseless demands of the fledglings; those fledglings are now teenagers and full of curiosity and daring-do; the trees are full of berries and nuts and banquet lies around every corner; crow rules of etiquette are optional.

There was a second, concrete and non-crow-related sign of a seasonal shift this morning.

As I stopped for a minute while Geordie did some intense tree sniffing, a man rode by on a bicycle. In the passenger seat was a little girl wearing a pink sequinned top and belting out “Jingle Bells” at the top of her lungs.

Clearly, crows and kids both march to their own seasonal drummers!

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© junehunterimages, 2024. 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.

 

Bongo’s Exciting Morning

/ The Urban Nature Enthusiast / 6 Comments

Life during nesting season is quite exciting enough for most crows.

Keeping the babies in the nest fed and un-eaten by others provides enough thrills,  thank-you very much.

Bongo usually deals with these challenges with expeditious equanimity. Eagle needs chasing — no problem. A cat stalking the nest needs to be schooled — count him in.

Last weekend, however, brought a sudden and (from a crow’s perspective) existential threat: an unprovoked attack from the very sky!

It was a quiet, damp, grey morning as we were walking the dog. Bongo, as usual, was keeping guard from a fence near the nest.

We humans had some warning, having heard hail was in the forecast, but from Bongo’s point of view, it was nothing short of a cataclysm when, suddenly and randomly, the sky declared war.

To his credit, he wasted no time running around and crying “The sky is falling!” but dove immediately under the nearest parked car.

The hail was short-lived and Bongo emerged unscathed — but with newly developed trust issues.

 

He kept looking at me too. I often find that the crows give me baleful looks in terrible weather, perhaps wondering if it was I who pulled the “make it rain/hail/snow” lever by accident.

In the storm’s immediate aftermath, Bongo’s head would snap up every few seconds to keep an eye on the now unreliable sky.
Inspired by his experience, and as a reminder of how other creatures perceive the world in a different way than we do, I have made a new print, called Up.

In another exciting, but unrelated, Bongo episode it appeared that he’d discovered the magic trick of disappearing his head into the road surface. Perhaps practicing for more hail?

Closer inspection revealed that he was drinking from a teeny, tiny pothole in the road.

 

 

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CALENDAR NEWS!
The new City Crow (with guest ravens) calendar is almost ready to go to the printer and it will be available to pre-order on my website very soon. Stay tuned for updates!

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© junehunterimages, 2024. 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.

The Status Crow

/ The Urban Nature Enthusiast / 9 Comments

Over the past few weeks, I’ve been fooled repeatedly.

I hear that insistent begging call, and I think — “Aha, a crow fledgling!”

There SHOULD be some out and about by now — but it’s been another perilous nesting season and each time I hear the begging call, it turns out to be not a fledgling, but a female crow calling out to her mate for food while she remains close to the nest.

Bella places an emphatic food order

Bongo delivers

At this time last year, Bongo and Bella’s fledglings had been out of the nest for almost two weeks and they looked on schedule for another early start. When we left for our trip to the UK in mid-April, Bella seemed to be sitting on eggs in their nice new nest. I’m not sure what happened in the month we were away, but they now have a new nest in a different tree and no sign of any fledglings yet.

Bongo, always near the nest on high alert

And poor Norman and Nancy! After a very trying start to the season, they were on their third nest effort when we left in April. When we got back in mid-May I was thrilled to see that, not only were they still on that nest, but I could see the heads of at least two little baby crows in there. Things were looking good!

But baby bird catastrophe struck overnight in some mysterious form (hawk, owl, eagle, raccoon, cat?) and the nest was abandoned.

A day later, Norman was out again on stick-gathering duty.  I don’t know where the new nest is  — and hopefully neither do the hawks, owls, eagles etc!

As for Marvin, Mavis and Lucky — they seem to have moved further away from our house following a short but heated territorial dispute with Norman.

Norman boldly ventured into what was hitherto Marvin and Mavis-land — was challenged by either Marvin or Lucky — and crankily refused to back down.

I’m not sure who’s who in this tussle. Fortunately, neither bird was injured — but the unseemly outburst was enough to convince Marvin, Mavis and Lucky to move a little further east for a quiet life.

The Walkers, back after their mysterious fall and winter disappearance, are still holding onto their old territory. Mr. Walker may have to be renamed Mr. Flapper as, since his eye injury, he does very little walking. His impaired vision has made him less confident and he seems to feel safer now on branches, wires and rooftops rather than strutting along the sidewalk as in days of yore.

Mr. Walker, May 2024

Wanda makes some desultory begging calls.

Wanda left, Mr Walker right.

The Walkers seem to be in nesting mode, but I can’t tell where the nest might be or at what stage they’re at, only that Wanda is begging for food.

Having only two good eyes between them, it’s going to be a challenge — but crows, as we all know, are determined and resourceful birds and the Walkers are veterans of nesting challenges.

A few blocks away, Earl and Echo had their first nest all completed back in April but, as with Bongo and Bella, something went wrong and they’ve had to relocate.

I’ve seen his Earl-ship around a lot, accompanied by last year’s fledging, but nary a trace of Echo …

… until a couple of days ago, when she emerged from what, judging by the state of her feathers, have been tumultuous times in the nest.

So that’s the nesting status-crow for now.
I’m expecting/hoping to see some baby crows in the ‘hood in the next week or so.

And when those babies DO emerge from the nest, remember that the parents will be (justifiably) beside themselves with worry as the fledglings stumble about helplessly on the ground until they get their flying skills sorted out.

Some crow fledgling tips:

 

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© junehunterimages, 2024. 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.