Ravens

After several days of waiting for the wind to drop a bit, last night was deemed suitable conditions.

So with my friend Marc we met up with fellow trainee Lorna and headed off to meet Brian and to pay a visit to a Raven's nest not far from him.

He knew that there were at least two chicks on the nest but that they were getting close to leaving so time was running out to ring them before they departed.

Last year I was away when the nest was checked. Lorna had been there but as there was only one chick to ring she got the short straw and the chick was ringed by someone else.

This year looked like we were going to get one each.

Brian went to the nest and there was actually three chicks. The adults were a bit noisy at first but soon quietened down. There has been some stories in the press recently about members of the corvid family recognising certain peoples voices and acting differently to when they heard a stranger's voice. Perhap these birds recognised Brian and knew that the chicks would not come to any harm.

The youngsters were fairly docile while being ringed, which made life a bit easier as they had sharp claws.

Whilst the adult Raven is a magnificent bird the youngsters like most other chicks were ugly in a cute sort of way. The irridescence in some of the feathers just goes to show that yet again that a bird that is usually considered black and boring actually has quite stunning plumage.

With all three youngsters ringed Brian returned them safely to the nest and the adults reappeared to reassure them that all was ok.

I was lucky enough to ring two out of the three chicks and we both got to ring a new species.

Hopefully we'll be back again next year to ring the next lot of youngsters.