the raven in residence

For the past several weeks, we've had a Raven hanging around the farm. He follows the ducks around and grabs their eggs as they lay them, taking them up to the roof of their shed to eat. (I can only imagine what a mess that roof is getting to be....) We really don't mind. He's a VERY cool bird, and pretty rare for this area, and very entertaining to watch -- if the ducks don't lay fast enough for him, he starts yelling at them! He's also HUGE, so watching him in flight is quite a treat. And he scares the smaller birds away, so we're saving money on chicken and duck feed. (I swear that we spend more feeding the sparrows and starlings than we do on our own birds.)

So we're happy to have him and he's welcome to stay as long as he wants! If we need ducks eggs, we can always put a few breeding sets under wire so he can't get their eggs. But for right now, we're satisfied feeding our big black visitor.