The Daily Bucket is a regular feature of the Backyard Science group. It is a place to note any observations you have made of the world around you. Animals, weather, meteorites, climate, soil, plants, waters are all worthy additions to the Bucket. Please let us know what is going on around you in a comment. Do include your location, as close as is comfortable for you. Each note is a record that we can refer to in the future as we try to understand the patterns that are unwinding around us.
Seattle. March 8, 2016.
I thought I heard a Common Raven’s quork! as I began my walk in the Forest today. The thing is, I've walked these gently wild urban places long enough to know that Common Ravens just don't hang out here in the city. The last time I saw one in the Forest was maybe a decade ago. I found that one by following the voices of a murder of mobbing crows. They drove it away. Ravens live in the mountains here. The city belongs to the Crows.
But the call came repeatedly as I walked and I had to turn back to find the source. 20 paces after I turned the quork! began to move along the edge of the Forest peninsula. I caught a glimpse of a black shape sliding just beyond a tree from where a Bald Eagle yelled.
Then silence. No wind. No little birds chatting in the canopy or the underbrush. No human voices or human machines.
I waited, I don't know how long.
quork!
The call came from north of me, stationary now. I turned again and walked towards it, ears perked like a dog's.
There. High up in a middle aged Douglas Fir, just a shadow behind the top branches.
quork!
quork!
Raven has a special place here in the Pacific Northwest. In the old stories he is Bringer of Light as well as Trickster, always eager to pull a stunt on anyone around him. I’ve done science most of my life and I'm really torn here, trying to find some kind of ground between stories and numbers.
I welcome Raven, thank him for his presence here today. I make a mental note to log in to eBird this evening to record his presence.
Raven flies from his hidden perch and lands in a Big-leaf Maple above my head, proceeds to pick great chunks of moss off of the highest arms of the Maple, throws them down. They fall all around me, so close that I can catch a few just by holding out my hands. I bring these fragments of a fragment of the city’s original landscape home, place them among the logs that are a part of our new native front yard. Maybe they'll settle in and spread. Maybe they won’t. Maybe Raven will have the last laugh.
This evening I reported the presence of a single Common Raven (Corvus corax) in the Forest to my local birding listserve and to eBird.
Seattle. March 8, 2016. One Common Raven was present in the Forest today.
Your turn now. Do share the latest nature gossip from your natural neighborhood.