A Fine Day for Soaring

Yesterday we went to check on our friend's house.  They are off to Baja California.  The house is located on the East side of the Napa Valley, high up on a ridge.  They have a panoramic view that extends from north of Yountville down to the Carneros by the San Pablo Bay.  It was a beautiful day in the neighborhood.  After checking the house we went outside to check the view.  Hark!!! I heard a raven call.  We looked up and there was a pair of ravens soaring on the thermal air masses.  They were soaring in circles.  They were close by each other with each bird completing a complete circle and then starting over again.  While they were doing these maneuvers, they never once flapped their wings!  When people ask me how can you tell a crow from a raven- that is one thing I tell them- ravens often glide about, crows do not.  Crows have to flap their wings to get places, while ravens can glide with their large wing span.  The display yesterday was beautiful proof of that fact.  Seeing the ravens soaring about made my day!!!!

Bold and Shy BAD Report

Bold and Shy up on Mt. Veeder have a bad report from our former next door neighbors.  They have been hanging around their property (actually Bold and Shy think that it is their property).  The neighbors put out some straw in the vineyard to keep the weeds down.  The ravens have been down in the straw looking for seeds.  There must be a real shortage of food this winter for them to go after such little seeds.  They have been sitting on the railing of the neighbors studio building and pooping on their decking and sometimes pecking the building.  I wonder if they think someone is in the building and they are trying to get their attention.  They used to hang on the window frames of my home to get my attention and FOOD.  If the food supply is very short this year there may not be any raven babies this spring. I will have to watch and listen for the next several months.  For some this will be a blessing because the babies are really LOUD, but I loved them.
My crow friend is here every day now.  He hangs out in the trees and watches for me in the morning.  Today I put out some chicken trimmings and he was very happy indeed.  I cut it up in crow sized pieces.  I am so accomodating and it is nice to have bird company while I work in the garden. There is nothing like a lively corvid for company.

MY CROW FRIEND

It appears that I have acquired a crow friend.  Yesterday I was working in the garden in the backyard when I started hearing this odd sound coming from the redwood tree which was over my head.  It was not a repetitious sound, each sound being unique and fairly loud.  I thought maybe it was a squirrel.  We have alot of squirrels that run all over the yard, up in the trees and across the roof.  I could not see into the redwood tree as the branches and leaves are so thick.  Therefore I backed up so that I could get a better perspective on the location of the sounds.  Low and behold!  It was a lone crow.  He was doing what the ravens used to do when they watched me work in the garden.  He would make some clicks and clacking sounds, then wipe each side of his beak on a redwood branch.  Then he would pull on a small redwood branch and break it off and make some more unusual sounds.  I couldn't believe it- the crow is a small sized raven and just as curious and noisy!  He watched me for a very long time.  I finally went inside and got some peanuts for the platform feeder.  This was his treat and a thankyou for keeping me company in the garden.
Since crows are such communal birds, I wonder why this one crow seems to know me and watch me.  Maybe he is the sentinel for his group.  Perhaps he is watching to see if I will bring some food out and then he lets the rest of the group know that dinner is served!  I don't know.  What I do know is that this crow shows up when I go outside to work, he hangs out, and talks to me in fun and unusual sounds.  What a treat for me.  It is nice to have company in the garden while one works away planting seeds and weeding.  I wonder what Mr. Crow will think when I finally get around to planting the FAIRY garden.  I hope to attract a Fairy or two and perhaps Mr. Crow will be able to see them and talk to them also.

The Clarion Crow

I have a crow who comes every morning at about 7:30 AM.  I call him the Clarion Crow.  He makes alot of noise to let me know that he has arrived and it ready to EAT!  This crow has a white spot on his tail and on one wing, so he is easily recognized.  Once I have delivered the food to the platform feeder, he lets all his buddies know that chow is available.  The crows like to sit on the top of the green arbor which is near the feeder.  They sit and look and check it out for some time before they fly over and light on the feeder.  I feed them the same foods that the ravens on Mt. Veeder liked.  Raw chicken eggs, left over meat scraps, old crackers, left over cat food, trimmed chicken fat, black oil sunflower seeds, peanuts are all food that the ravens liked.  Usually the ravens would go for the meat and fat first.  The crows usually go for the peanuts first.  The ravens and crows have similar behaviors.  I watched a crow try to stuff 3 peanuts in the shell into his bill at once.  A raven could have done it.  The crow tried mightily but could just manage 2 peanuts at a time.  He seemed quite disgusted.  The crows are getting used to me.  I talk to them and they watch me and do not fly off like they use to do when I go outside to join them.  The other day when I was working in the yard the Clarion Crow was up in the redwood tree over my head.  He started clicking and clacking, making sounds very similar to the sounds that ravens make.  The crow sounds are at a higher pitch but clicking and clacking away.  It was so nice to hear that sound.  I don't hear it very often from the crows.  I wonder why? Later that day the stealth raven flew in to grab up a big hunk of chicken fat.  He is still around but wary due such a raucous bunch of crows in the neighborhood.
It has been raining the last couple of days.  This has caused Redwood Creek to start running again.  I love to listen to the creek music- so much like my days on Mt. Veeder.  I am lucky down here- I have large redwood trees and a creek nearby- it is not so bad living in the valley when I think about it.  There are benefits, close to grocery stores and NO wood moving and the Clarion Crow.

Visiting the Ravens of Mt. Veeder

Yesterday I visited the ravens of Mt. Veeder where I used to live.  It was the first time that I had been to the property since we left, 1.5 years ago.  I just couldn't go before.  It was too sad.  But yesterday was great and the raven pair were there making lots of racket, just for me.  We had a great time, yelling back and forth at each other.  They probably wondered where the eggs were.  My good friend's property is contiguous with our former property, so from their vantage point I could see where I used to live.  It looked fine and well cared for which was such a relief.  When we sold our former home in Concord, the new owners trashed the place and I can't even go down that street anymore.  It is too sad to see what has happened to a property that used to be so lovely.  Any way- I was happy to see Bold and Shy and I think that they were happy to see me, even without the eggs.  Next time I will take eggs and put them in a special place along the road where they can retreive them.

THE CROW PAIR

Well what can I say- I have attracted a crow pair with my daily egg.  The stealth raven comes once in awhile but I never know when he will come and so I don't get to see him pick up the whole egg and fly off.  BUT- there is this one crow who seems to think that I am OK and now he has a buddy that comes with him.  Of course I don't know if they are male or female since all of them are all black, so I will say he for now.  I have been talking to this one crow for some time now.  He comes in the morning and crows from the top of the oak tree next door.  So when I hear him, I have been going out and putting some peanuts and an egg in the platform feeder.  He sees this food appear and now he knows from whence it comes.  Now there are 2 crows that come at about 7 AM each morning and sit on top of the arbor which is near the platform.  They look quite good sitting up there, very majestic.  So now it is me and two crows instead of two ravens.  Well they are cousins and seem just as smart and wily as ravens.  Maybe more so since crows seem to be almost universally disliked except by me, bird lovers, and goths.  So now I am putting food out in the evening so there is something there for them in the morning.  I cannot put out peanuts in the evening because their smaller cousins, the blue jays, will scarf them all up before the crows arrive.  So it goes in nature.  You never know who will be your friend, sort of like Facebook- who are those friends anyway who show up???  I can now make a project out of determining what crows really like to eat.  This will be fun.  When I had my raven pair that visited me up on Mt. Veeder, I discovered that I had very little waste food.  They liked things like chicken fat and left over cat food that I normally would throw away.  I say it is a form of recycling- feed the birds instead of the garbage can!  So onward with the crow pair with occasional visits from the stealth raven!

The Cottage on Mt. Veeder in RAVEN Territory

We finally got to go up to Mt. Veeder to look at the cottage that is near our former home and raven pair.  What a disappointment.  I was so disappointed.  This cottage is in very bad condition.  I can honestly say it had no redeeming features except for the location on Mt. Veeder and the very nice view of the hills.  This cottage sold for more than $550,000 in 2007.  The person who made this loan should be ashamed- it is scandalous actually. The persons involved in this sale, the realtors, the banks, the mortgage companies all made money on this deal but there is no value there.  Deals like this times many thousands of similar deals and I can certainly see why there is a real estate collapse right now.
The cottage is now a short sale.  The asking price is $299,000.  The person who owns it is way under water.  It is not worth $299,000, maybe $100,000.  Everything would have to be redone, the foundation is iffy, the floor slopes this way and that, there is junk everywhere,- needs a dumpster right now.  Anyhow I was BUMMED out by what I saw. I honestly was very upset by what I saw.  So that is the end of that dream.  It would take so much energy and money to try and get that place in some kind of order that it would not be worth it.  Good luck to someone with lots of time, money and energy.
This week we were up in Mendocino to take in the Pacific Ocean.  The weather was nice but the best part was all the RAVENS!  There were ravens everywhere, flying here and there and doing acrobatics in the air.  I had a great time watching them.  They were floating over the ocean on the thermals.  It was great to see.  I had a conversation with a few ravens who were sitting on water tower perches.  They clicked and clacked back at me.  Always fun and a joy.  The economy has hit Mendocino ( or Spendocino as it was known in the good old high rolling money days).  Alot of the cute stores were closed up for good.  Too bad.  The cute needlework shop was gone.  Ah well- RAVENS are better than stores any day!