This raven in Nova Scotia was impaled by four porcupine quills (one wonders how that happened), and allowed a human to pull them all out. I can’t believe the raven came to the humans for help (look at it objecting to the treatment!), but why would a wild raven allow people to get so close to it?
Here’s the caption from YouTube:
A wild raven perched himself on our fence and squawked for over an hour. I went to see what was up with him and saw that he had four porcupine quills stuck in him, three in the side of his face and one in his wing. This video shows my Mom taking out the ones in his face. Very bizarre he let us get that close and even more bizzare he let my Mom pull the quills out. He hung around for the day and was gone the next. Best of luck Wilfred (yeah, I named him) lol
More from CTV News:
Gertie Cleary says she spotted the young raven perched on a fence and when she noticed the quills stuck to its face, she knew she had to help.
(Gertie)
Gertie Cleary says she spotted the young raven perched on a fence and when she noticed the quills stuck to its face, she knew she had to help.
“I was face to face with this raven,” says the Elmsdale, N.S. resident.
The bird, clearly in pain, waited for Cleary to get each one of the quills out. Cleary says she didn’t think twice about helping the animal in distress.
“It reminded me of a child with a splinter and when you pull a splinter out, they holler and screech and pull their hand away,” says Cleary.
Once the quills were out, Cleary carried the bird to her daughter’s house, where she fed him dog food and water.
. . . Hope Swinimer, the founder and director of Hope for Wildlife, says short of calling a wildlife society, Cleary did everything right in this situation.
“It is important that people take interest in the natural world around them,” says Swinimer. “When they see an animal in distress, they should do something about it.”
Swinimer says the bird that landed on Cleary’s property was a young raven fledgling and that if she hadn’t helped the animal, it probably wouldn’t have survived.
Wow — trusting bird, indeed! I don’t think I’ve ever seen a raven that would let me approach close enough for me to reach out and touch it.
One almost wonders if it was raised as a pet….
b&
That’s exactly what I was thinking. I’d love to think he knew he’d get help but I suspect he wanted a meal.
I think it is imprinted. Had a pet crow decades ago when that was still legal. Great fun.
Incredible! This reminds me of the video of the fox with his head in the jar. I find this apparent predilection of animals in trouble to “seek out” humans for help astonishing and fascinating. ARE they seeking them out? It would seem so.
I don’t think the fox sought out the humans. This raven clearly did.
b&
Possible about the fox. But it is interesting to see in that previous video that the fox seems to almost run TOWARD the guy when he gets out of his car. But as Jerry said at the time, it’s possible too that the fox was just disoriented.
My guess is that this “apparent predilection” is most likely the result of sampling bias. Injured or distressed animals that happen to approach humans become YouTube stars; those that don’t, we never hear about. So we have no idea how common this “predilection” actually is.
Excellent point Gregory. I hadn’t thought about that but now that you say it, it makes complete sense.
Ravens are cool. (And an interesting book about them is “Mind of the Raven” by Bernd Heinrich.)
I’m a fan of Heinrich’s books too. There is also ‘The Geese of Beaver Bog’ which details his observations of Canada geese. ‘The Snoring Bird’ is probably my favourite of his books. It goes into his family history (quite a tale actually) and follows his father’s life of specimen collecting (reminiscent of Wallace) He must have been one the last people to collect specimens in the wild. Heinrich is then able to compare this with his own career as a ‘modern’ biologist. Interestingly, he points out how valuable all the specimens have become again with the advent of genetic testing.
Always enjoyable reading especially with Heinrich’s own illustrations.
People are still collecting specimens in the wild. I do it. I know lots of others who do as well. 🙂
Of course, collecting is irresistible, I do it too! I wrote too quickly and wasn’t very clear. His father made his living collecting and selling specimens to museums and universities, work that became harder and harder for him to find as the 20th century wore on. (The expedition to find the snoring bird of the title, could easily be mistaken for the story of a naturalist from a couple of generations earlier.) Heinrich contrasts that with his own experience as a university educated biologist in a way that I found quite interesting. (Heinrich Sr. also apparently had a huge passion for ichneumon wasps)
Ah. Making a living from collecting specimens is perhaps gone entirely.
impaled by four porcupine quills (one wonders how that happened)
Eating roadkill would by my guess.
He learned his lesson, though. In an interview, when asked about eating porcupine, he was quoted as saying “Nevermore”.
Sorry, I couldn’t help myself.
Great! I wish I had thought of that!
+1 Dave! Cheers for the chuckle.
Great, this is just how mutualism gets started.
Some intrepid individual comes to you ONE TIME and your descendants are cleaning off their parasites till the sun explodes…
I suspect the raven is somewhat tame. Perhaps kept as a pet at some point. Crows and ravens make good but naughty pets. 🙂
I can’t imagine such a bird as an indoor / cage pet. Making friends with a wild one, sure…but those’re big birds, and they need space.
b&
Typically anyone who has one doesn’t keep it in a cage and lets it have free run. When my dad was growing up in Nova Scotia his cousins had one and it used to terrorize the neighbourhood by upsetting glass milk bottles to get the coins and stealing pegs from clothes lines(dumping the clothes on the ground.
There is a reason these guys are in native mythology as tricksters. I love their sassiness! 🙂
Sounds like my kind of bird!
There’s a pair that migrates through the neighborhood, but they never stay for more than a couple / few days. All the rest of the corvids in the area are grackles, which aren’t nearly as much fun. Up in Flagstaff, though, they’ve got lots of big black birds.
b&
Grackles are actually Icterids. 🙂
Yes indeedy. And grackles are pretty entertaining, IMO; maybe not to watch (I’m not a bird-watcher), but they’re a lot more entertaining to listen to than crows & ravens.
I never knew that — for some reason, I always thought they were corvids.
Thanks for the correction!
b&
I think there’s definitely some visual and also behavioral similarities between grackles and corvids.
For anyone who’s interested: Corvids include jays, crows, ravens, & magpies. Blackbirds, grackles, orioles, meadowlarks, bobolinks, and cowbirds are all Icterids. Judging by how far the families are apart in the guides (because I’m too lazy now even to Google!) the two families are not that closely related.
Diane missed a few. Corvids include:
crows, ravens, rooks, jackdaws, jays, magpies, treepies, choughs, and nutcrackers.
Thx, sacha, obviously I was being too parochial. But I should have at least remembered the nutcracker! 🙂
I really like ravens and crows! We don’t have ravens here but the crows are very shy. In the city they aren’t but where I am, you can’t even move by the window without startling them. I’ve noticed they will fly in 2s or 3s and one guy is the look out guy while the other crows eat seeds or whatever.
Judging by the gape flange, this is a pretty young bird. Fledglings are frequently said to present as innocent, trusting (or at least, not yet fearful where they should be), and curious. Esp. in birds as smart as corvids, a lot of their behavior may be learned. This bird may also not be a very skilled flier yet.
I would have thought there would be (raven) family around somewhere near, making their presence known!
How wonderful that this woman helped this bird! It might still have been a good idea to take it to a wildlife rehab, in case it needed antibiotics to prevent infection.
I like the way the horse and the d-g are part of the equation, too. 🙂
Aren’t those raven calls in the background at about 1:36, then starting about 2:00 until the end?
I’m very astonished that the raven would allow this behavior from the human. I’ve seen notcats put up far more fuss when the operation is performed on them and notcats generally need to be held so they won’t leave.
Thanks for pointing out the other partners in crime I was so focused on the raven that I wasn’t conscious of them.
I think people shoot at the ravens around here because they seem particularly fearful, and, someone around here was purposely shooting near me last week so I suppose shooting at a raven would be easy for a no brain.
And thanks to you for pointing out the background calls. 🙂 It’s funny, they sound like American Crows to me; but then they’re faint and my little laptop’s speakers are rather tinny…I suppose they would be ravens.
I would hope the rescuers released the fledgling eventually and that its family took over.
With an animal-centric family like that it’s possible their local ravens are accustomed to them, and not as fearful. I have a crow family that hangs around and is getting more comfortable in my presence. They fly off when I get too close, but not very far off, waiting for me to put down their peanuts and leave. 🙂
It’s occurred to me that that probably ticks off the corn farmers around me. AFAIK it’s illegal to shoot crows or ravens (or any passerine with the exception of a few introductions). But maybe you’re not in the U.S. 🙂 Or, as you say, it’s a matter of the no-brains.
Yes, wasn’t it surprising that the youngster put up with what must have been painful?! It may well have been in a more debilitated state than it appeared to be; birds are notorious for hiding distress.
And Ha_ha @ “notcats!” 😀
yes, they are crows, not ravens
When you aren’t sure, do what I do & call them “cravens”. I did this when in BC because I never knew (we don’t have ravens here).
After listening again and again and again. And listening to crows and ravens at allbirds.com I definitively…don’t know but, now leaning toward your’s and sacha’s identification as American Crows. With the exception that there may be a raven call (very faint) just when Wilfred is getting the flower at the end of the video. And I might be reading too much into it but Wilfred seems to direct “his” attention to the trees in the background at that time.
Looks like they allowed Wilfred to decide how long to stay, from the original posting comment at YouTube:
The first few viewer comments at YouTube give a little more info about Gertie. She trains horses and apparently is known for special care for animals. As you describe, an observant raven might be aware of such things.
The corn farmers will just add any loss into their subsidy request. 😉 A few years ago when I owned a small plot with a house I’d feed the magpies peanuts. I knew it was feeding time by looking out the window and seeing them all lined up on the fence. They were so funny! I’m currently in New Mexico and have only seen one magpie, over at the small park in town. I’m located toward the edge of the city limits and people aren’t supposed to be shooting at all, though a substantial portion of the population are christian tea bagging NRA advocates (it’s odd that they think tea is respectable now, even those that still drink coffee) that only respect the laws that agree with their agenda at any particular time. They live under their own (i.e., “doG’s law”) law.
One does not need to listen in order to identify the youngster as a crow. I used to list the differences for those interested, but now I can link a video:
the differences between crows and ravens 101:
Nothing like going to the source for filling in the gaps. Thanks for the further info, Notagod.
And of course, good for Gertie! 😀
I hear ya about right-wing neighbors. A decade or so ago our neighborhood was staked out by the cops because the parents of a Michigan Militia member wanted for murder lived just down the street and around the corner.
But there’s some cognitive dissonance for me as well. Many of said neighbors are classic salt o’ the earth types, self-reliant, there when you need ’em (which can happen out in the sticks). There’ve been a few times I’ve been glad to know they’re armed. Most don’t seem to be rabid tea-partiers, though when we exchange pleasantries at the polls I know they’re there cancelling my vote. Perhaps I’m improving their opinions of liberals a tiny bit, tho.
(They’re also family farmers scratching to hang on, working day jobs in factories or the slaughterhouse. Don’t think the ag subsidies do much to float their boats. IMO their cognitive dissonance must far exceed mine!)
I was driving down the highway between Mason and Llano in Texas one day. At a good distance I saw a turkey vulture beside the road. Even at a distance I could tell it was puzzled. It struck me as odd that I could come to that conclusion. When I drove by, I saw that the vulture was trying to figure out how to eat a road kill porcupine.
We live in Nakusp, in the West Kootenay area of British Columbia – we have lots of ravens who love to taunt our dogs and cats – all the animals have a very healthy respect for the ravens who know they can dine with impunity from the dogs’ and cats’ food and water dishes. Our dogs are a 100 lb Pyrenees X and a 110 lb Maremma – both lie as still as corpses, with their chins flat on the sun-deck all the time the ravens are feeding and drinking. Our two cats disappear into the house when they hear the ravens approaching.
Great story. 😀
this is a juvenile crow, not a raven.
The porcupine was not dead – quills don’t fly by themselves.
The most logical explanation is that the young crow was walking too close to the porcupine because it was curious, not having enough experience to keep a safe distance, and the porcupine reacted to a perceived threat.
Regardless I’m quite happy that the women helped the crow.
I don’t think quills fly at all. They are pulled out of the porcupine after the victim is impaled. They aren’t projectiles.
” . . . this is a juvenile crow, not a raven.”
I thought so! Should be more confident. I don’t see a lot of ravens but I do see crows of all ages regularly.
Agree with gb that porcupine quills are not “thrown,” but otherwise suspect you’re right about the curious fledgling encounter. 🙂
yep, I was wrong about the flying quills! I know a lot about corvids, and canines, not so much about porcupines.
Well done Canada!
Perhaps being stung by a porcupine quill conveys the message “trust a human instead” – my dogs used to come to me to have the quills pulled out of their snouts, a procedure as painful to me as to them. these quills have fishhooks! stupid dogs never learned.
I volunteer at a local wildlife hospital and specialize in crows and ravens. This is a very young bird and naive bird, and very possibly weak and emaciated since it isn’t flying away. The raven’s reaction to the rescuer’s hand–the bird is gaping, but in a frightened and defensive way, and the gape turns into a peck–is typical of a young bird that is hungry but also fearful.
Nice website, Pamela!
(And thanks for the experience-based input.)