We’re back with readers’ photos. First, a Maxfield Parrish-like landscape from Idaho, taken (and tweaked) by Stephen Barnard:
Reader Ed Kroc sends a passel/group/murder of raven photos (I don’t know the correct term for the group):
A large batch of raven photos for your consideration! All are of the Common Raven (Corvus corax), one of the most widespread species of bird on the planet. Their range encompasses virtually the entire globe north of the Tropic of Cancer. Apparently, they evolved in Eurasia and took the same path as humans did into North America over the Bering land bridge.
Juvenile ravens congregate in gangs when they finally leave their parents’ territory. These teenage droves hang together for a couple of years, learning to socialize, steal, hunt, play, invent, and court (or is it love?). Part of a gang of about fifteen are pictured in the first photo, lazing around the shore at Island View Beach on a cloudy day in Saanich, BC (just north of Victoria on Vancouver Island).
The next photo shows another of the group yawning. I always find it amazing that even their tongues are black! I’ve often wondered why these birds (and many of the planet’s crows) are all black; is their some kind of adaptive advantage conferred by such dark and monochromatic colouration?
A pair just a little off from the main group seemed to be involved in a bit of courtship. This sequence of three photos shows the first raven offering up his/her bill in a submissive position, then the partner grasping the bill after considering it for a few seconds, and finally the first of the pair grasping his/her partner’s bill back. Juvenile ravens tend to find mates and pair off after a few years living in these groups, after which the pair will go off and establish its own territory somewhere else.
In Mount Seymour Provincial Park in North Vancouver, BC, a pair of adult ravens keep part of their territory on the heavily hiked Dog Mountain. The first photo shows the female perched on a tree.
I was eating lunch and drawing the attention of the resident whiskeyjacks— i.e., Grey Jays (Perisoreus canadensis)—with my crumbs. The ravens didn’t appreciate these interlopers in their territory, and the male quickly swooped down in front of me and puffed right out to show his displeasure. In this photo, the male raven was close enough to me that if I fully outstretched my arm, I could poke his eye out! He stayed agitated and puffed up for about a minute, much to the chagrin of some of the other hikers.
Finally he calmed down and hopped to my side, content to inspect me a bit and maybe figure out why I thought I had the right to just lounge about in his territory. His gaze turned contemplative for a minute or two before he decided he had better things to do and took to the forest with his mate.
Hi Stephen, did your mouse accidently slip while on the “colour saturation” slider? 🙂
It does look kind of saturated, but still a wonderful photograph. Thanks Stephen.
I shot the landscape from a ladder (at 24mm full frame) to minimize glare on the water. I wanted to expose both the the sky which was very bright and the view into the water which was dark, so I shot an HDR at +/-1 EV. I deliberately cranked up the saturation up to get the Maxfield Parrish effect. It was in the nature of an experiment, but I liked how it turned out.
Love the raven photos. They’re such cool birds.
Ignore the extra *the* and *up*. 🙂
Thanks!
Ravens are so interesting and smart. Many times, I have exchanged croaking “conversations” with them in the mountains, including in Mt. Seymour Park.
I wonder how courting ravens know that they’re courting a bird of the right sex. I know how at leaf one species of penguin does it (males drop a pebble offering in front af a potential mate. Depending how the recipient reacts the donor can figure out the sex.)
I’m imagining a raven version of The Crying Game now.
I think it’s an unkindness of ravens. Sad, but better than murder, I guess.
Seems to be so. It should be noted that many of these terms were originally considered “humorous or whimsical”, though they’ve now become just another set of quirks of English.
According to Wikipedia, many of these trace back to
I do like the “disworship” ; I’ll have to exercise that one at the next available opportunity.
Actually, an “uncredibility of cuckolds” may get an outing too, if the opportunity arises ; since the bar normally has a “red top” newspaper (tabloid or “scandal rag” in colloquial EN_GB) floating around for the customers, there will be likely an appropriate story on the front page.
How about a concroakation of ravens? 🙂
Or a cacawphony?
Brilliant!
How about a cawcophony of crows and perhaps also of ravens??
A grumble of ravens!
…or a craven of ravens.
Wonderful pictures. Stephen, that photo is much like a Monet painting!
I love ravens. Big, confident.. a bird that looks right back at you, as if you were an object of study.
I notice all the fine feathers that project forward over the nostrils. Perhaps this is to help filter out dust and debris as they probe around in the leaves, looking for food.
Why are they all black? It could be they can afford to not be camouflaged, staying together with lookouts, and they are big enough to not have too many enemies. Their color could help them see each other at a distance. Also, their prey is not the sort of thing that can see them. So it could be a combination of communication and lack of need for camo.
Interesting, I like that “no need for camo” hypothesis. I wonder also if there is some influence from the fact that they do not flock with other species, so no need for quick visual cues to tell each other apart.
These are the Devil’s birds! They are black because of the evil emanating from them! You Atheists are going to hell for considering any other explanation! They look at you like that because the Devil recognizes his own!
(Was that enough !!!? Perhaps I should’ve used caps lock and included a few misspellings.
Great pics btw …
Google “Georgina and Esther and Satan” for a hilarious ( and rude:) take by Key and Peele as church ladies🐱
Lol, thanks! (Definitely needs a few misspellings though. Far too coherent to pass as a real rant!)
Lovely ravens! Ravens don’t live where I live so I have to go out West to see them.
In the first picture, the ravens in the lower half of the frame look like they are quietly laughing at something. The guy on the left especially looks like he’s in on the joke.
🙂
Great shots. I was in Death Valley in the summer maybe 10 years ago, and the huge ravens ( msybe crows?) all flew around with their mouths wide open, sort of panting. It was at least 110F in the shade. The outdoor drinking fountain at the hotel had water hot enough to make tea. The birds’ feet were all gnarly, I assumed from being scorched.
Douglas Adams (in voce Arthur Dent) would likely disagree. You might get slightly brown water, but not tea. Making tea needs the water to be as close to boiling as possible when it hits the leaves. With the thermal inertia of the element in an electric kettle, you can still have steam bubbling from the element as you are pouring the water ; with a stove-top kettle, it’s a bit harder unless it’s a pretty heavyweight kettle.
George Orwell has his dictatorial two cents worth on the subject too.
This water was hot as hell;-) We had to add ice from the ice machine to even drink it!
(in any case, I’m sure as a Brit/Scot you’d consider the tea I drink to be “gnat’s piss”. I don’t like it strong…)
I grew up in Eaaast Aaaanglia, wheeeeere they speeeeeak brrrooooaarrrd ; it’s “maddens pass-watter” to me. On which subject … time for the quiz!
maddens passwatter??
“maiden’s pass(-ed) water”
anyone would think that we weren’t speaking the same language. Lingo. Gibber. Govorit. Gabble. Whatever.
I like strong tea. I have a hard time finding tea that is strong enough and not like weasel’s piss.
Although I’ve never had the pleasure? of experiencing weasel piss, i’d imagine it to be strong…
I always thought that too but people use it to describe weak tea. Maybe it’s the way the word, “weasel” sounds.
That only applies to certain British teas. Green teas should be brewed at no more than about 175°F / 80°C. That’s also about the ideal temperature for making coffee, at least with an Aeropress. For the teas I tend to brew, I never go above 200°F / 94°C; boiling tends to ruin them.
Steep time varies per variety, too…the one constant is two grams of tea (regardless of volume) per eight ounces / 250 ml of water.
b&
There are an infinte(*) variety of ways to wrongly brew warm brown fluids. And a greater infinity of ways to brew them wrongly.
(*) For values of Infinity not greater than Cantors first asylum incarceration.
Given such a plethora of the infinitely worng, it’s amazing anybody ever brews anything not completely unlike tea. Most improbable, one might even suggest.
Say, how’s that penguin doing?
b&
The penguin is in a three-way priority dispute with Bill and a Cantorian crowd of monkeys.
How is Bill these days? Is he still happy with that second head? It was all the fashion rage when he got it, but the trend since then has been towards digital wristwatches….
b&
That’s Zaphod. you know – shake hands with two people without having to put his drink down anywhere other than one of his necks.
Bill Hamnetfather, as they wouldn’t say in Sweden or Iceland.
Dreamy photo by Stephen and the ones by Ed are bright and lively.
Has anyone here read Charles Dickens’ BARNABY RUDGE? The title character has a pet raven that talks! It was based on Dickens’ own pet raven and inspired Edgar Allen Poe to write “The Raven,” since he thought Dickens had under-utilized the device of having a talking raven deliver prophecies. But Dickens wasn’t interested in writing Gothic poetry, and I find his use of the raven more interesting and realistic (it likes randomly shouting “I’m a Devil!” and accompanies its master around like a d__g).
Though one of Dickens’ lesser-read books, BARNABY RUDGE is a pretty good read. As for talking ravens, you can find several on youtube. One can even imitate a British accent!
The image of the water is incredibly lovely. I’m glad you liked it well enough to send it on.
The most recent newsletter from Cornell’s Laboratory of Ornithology has a nice video on telling crows and ravens apart, no doubt all to obvious to you but perhaps not to all of us. It is titled “Caw vs. Crock: Inside the calls of Crows and Ravens”. It includes visuals, too. (You Tube).
I’ll try this, unsure of the URL policy but the title is above so it is easy to find if the URL is bytten.
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Wonderful artistry, Stephen!
Like the rest, I love ravens. Once or twice a year, one or two will spend a moment or three near my house, never long enough. Lots of them up in Flagstaff, though….
b&
According to the definitive reference on the terms of venery — An Exaltation of Larks, by James Lipton (1991, Viking), the word for group of ravens is an “unkindness,” from the widespread legend in ancient times that ravens push their young from the nest to be “nourished with dew from heaven.”
Regarding monochromaticism in birds: Over the past 3-4 decades, when I’ve been noticing the pigeons in my area of the city, I’ve seen perhaps 10 or so all-white pigeons. But over the decades, I’ve only ever seen ONE that appeared to be all black. Anyone have similar experience?
Ed, thanks for the wonderful raven shots and informative accompanying info. Ravens fascinate and sometimes unsettle me…their expressions seem to carry all sorts of implications, not to mention an impressive intelligence.
Stephen, you have quite the artistic touch. I quite enjoy your “experiments!”