Subject: [Tweeters] The demise of baby Ray/e
Date: Jul 8 21:16:21 2010
From: Kelly Cassidy - lostriver at completebbs.com


For the first year since we've lived here, we did not have a pair of nesting
Great Horned Owls on the property. Probably not coincidentally, we had our
first pair of nesting Ravens. I like the owls, but they certainly discourage
many other large nesters.



The Ravens were actually right next door, nesting on a high platform on a
grain silo. There was only one chick, a noisy guy we named baby Ray or
maybe Rae, since he might have been a she. Baby Ray/e took his fledgling
flight (or fall) from the nesting platform about a week ago. He/she has
been hopping around the silos with little fear of people or cars, doing his
best to get run over for about a week. Both parents were around and still
feeding him. His primaries were growing, but he seemed to be taking an
awfully long time to get his wings under him, so to speak, making me wonder
if he didn't take that dive off the platform a week too early.



Sadly, we found baby Ray/e's body near the road with apparent head trauma
yesterday. He finally got himself hit by a car. Even knowing that most
baby birds don't make it to adulthood, when it's "your" baby bird, you can't
help rooting for it.



Ah, well, baby Ray/e will now enter a new phase of his/her existence as a
museum specimen. When I get around to preparing him/her, I will find out if
it was baby Ray or baby Rae.



Kelly Cassidy,

Pullman, WA