Subject: [Tweeters] Interesting Raven behavior
Date: Nov 7 22:59:56 2010
From: RH Johnston - rhjohnston9587 at comcast.net


I once saw a Hawk, species unknown, chasing a covey of chukars in the breaks of the Yakima River. The chukars dived into a thicket of buck brush. The hawk landed on a rock above the thicket, sat there for a few minutes and then started jumping up and down on the rock and screaming, after a short time the covey flushed and the hawk caught one. Looked like an on purpose flush to me. Bob Johnston
----- Original Message -----
From: Rob Sandelin
To: tweeters at u.washington.edu
Sent: Sunday, November 07, 2010 10:16 PM
Subject: [Tweeters] Interesting Raven behavior


I moved a bunch of wood today from my woodshed in back of my house. I was going back and forth from the woodpile to the house and a raven flew into a tree and sat watching me with considerable interest. Ravens are not common and not sure what to expect, I kept an eye on it as I went back and forth moving wood to the house. As I pulled the last layer of wood from a stack, a deer mouse bolted out and zipped under a piece of junk plywood about 10 feet away. The raven perked up and had obviously seen the rodent but my presence was deterring it so I walked back to the house and got my bins. >From my deck I could see the raven and the board with the mouse under it quite clearly. The raven flew down next to the board and cocked its head as if to hear the rodent, then it hopped over to the woodpile and picked up a kindling shard. It flew up into the air and dropped the kindling piece onto the board! It then sort of hovered overhead, no doubt hoping that the noise of the dropping wood would spook the mouse into the open. That did not work but what happened next was unbelievable. The plywood was lying on a tree branch on the ground with part of the board about 3 inches off the ground. The raven landed on the plywood edge and the weight of the bird caused the plywood to move a bit. The Raven then began hopping around, causing the plywood to bounce a bit up and down. I did not see the mouse exit from under the plywood but the Raven did, and flew/hopped and pounced and then flew away with the mouse in its talons. I was left wondering if the raven landed on the board and discovered it was unstable, or if the something about dropping the kindling piece on it alerted it, or the bird figured out that the plywood was movable, or it was all just a remarkable lucky coincidence that the bird took advantage of it. Either way, it was a very impressive lesson on how to catch a mouse, and the fact that it tried two different strategies. Pretty damn clever.

Rob Sandelin
Naturalist, Writer, Teacher
Snohomish County


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