Hi Everyone,

Here's an interesting note about corvids feeding themselves at our expense and without human help. I am contemplating a kayak trip on the Bowron Lakes circuit in British Columbia next summer and so have been reading a guide book about it. Critters - particularly since it is bear country and bears up there include grizzlies - are one of the significant concerns when planning the trip. One of the critters that the guidebook warns about is the raven. Corvid intelligence is well known, of course, and the Bowron Park ravens long ago learned what zippers are and how they operate. When doing portages, you have to take care to protect anything (like backpacks) that has zippers on it because the ravens will quickly unzip them and help themselves to anything edible inside (and probably to make things even more interesting, may fly off with non-edible items they find interesting as well) if the packs are left unprotected for even a short period of time.

John Tubbs
Snoqualmie, WA
johntubbs at comcast.net
www.tubbsphoto.com


-------------- Original message --------------
From: "Ruth Taylor" <rutht at seanet.com>

> Hi All:
>
> If you can stand one more post about feeding Gray Jays, sometimes the
> feeding is unintentional. Years ago, several of us stopped for lunch during
> a hike on Mt Baker. I learned what a Gray Jay was when one intercepted half
> a sandwich on its way to its owner's mouth. He (the sandwich owner) was so
> startled that he let out a yell, dropped the sandwich, and the jay got away
> with part of it when it fell. Based on hiking experiences, I also learned to
> identify the other "camp robber" (Clark's Nutcracker) several years before I
> became interested in birds.
>
>
> Ruth Taylor
> Seattle/Ballard
> rutht AT seanet dot com
>
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