I may have accidentally befriended a raven. Without using food.
(The photo is of one of magpies in my garden eating cat food)
A while ago I decided I wanted to befriend the local crows. I set up feeding platforms and water in my garden and started leaving eggs, nuts, kibble and raw meat out for corvids.
Exactly one crow showed up in the beginning.
But there are now about 20 Eurasian magpies hanging around my garden, yelling, bathing, caching food and generally behaving as if I built the whole thing specifically for them (duh).
There’s also a family of ravens nearby, but they were more of a curiosity. Ravens are quite rare where I live and tend to avoid humans, probably because there’s plenty of food in the surrounding woods. I’d hear them occasionally, see them flying over the houses, and once one landed on my roof, but they never touched the food. I have cameras pointed at the feeders, so I’m fairly sure about that.
Then I noticed something weird.
I have several dogs and I call them using a pretty distinctive sequence of names. At some point I realized that when I called my dogs outside, in the forest or in the park, I would sometimes hear a raven go ‘grok grok grok’ shortly afterwards.
Then I started noticing one raven passing over my garden more often, sometimes daily, and grokking while I was outside.
One day my dog wandered a bit farther from the path in the woods. I was calling him the usual way when I heard ‘grok grok grok’ coming from the old trees by the river.
Obviously, this could very easily be coincidence. The ravens live nearby, I know they’re often somewhere around, and once you start looking for a pattern you’re extremely good at finding one…So I started deliberately testing it.
I’d first listen for ravens and, when I was reasonably sure none were calling, I’d call my dogs (in random places like my yard, forest, park, riverside) More often than not, I’d get ‘grok grok grok’ back.
Another day I saw three ravens flying over the trees by the river. I called, and they flew over to me, circled high above my head a few times, then continued on their way.
But yesterday it got ridiculous!
I was walking my dogs in the park, made sure I couldn’t hear a raven anywhere, and called..
I heard almost immediately ‘grok grok grok’ somewhere far away!! Moments later a raven was sitting in the trees above me, still grokking!
This time I left a few unshelled peanuts on the path and continued walking. A few minutes later I came back and the peanuts were gone! (But could have been a squirrel ofc, though they are not as bold as American squirrels)
Later that same day I took the dogs swimming by the river, about a mile from the park. Again, no raven visible and no calling beforehand. I did my usual dog call and waited.
After a long pause, from somewhere in the distance: ‘grok grok grok’
At this point it has happened too many times, in so many places for me to dismiss the whole thing as wishful thinking. I still don’t know whether I’m interacting with the same raven every time, or exactly what the raven has learned about my calls. Maybe it started as simple curiosity and then my habit of responding to it made the interaction worth repeating?
I also find it funny that food apparently had almost nothing to do with this. I spent all that effort building feeders and leaving increasingly ridiculous raven-approved meals around my garden, and the thing that actually got one interested in me seems to have been me standing around yelling “Koziuuu! Keee!” lol.
I have no idea what happens next, but I’m ridiculously excited to see whether this continues.
The crows still haven’t shown up. ;)
TLDR: Wild Raven spontaneously started reacting to a dog recall cue.