Description

Barney the Christmas Raven
Just before christmas 2018, we noticed a raven that didn’t seem able to fly. He was walking around our yard cleaning up grain and horse feed that was on the ground. I assumed his wing was broken, so I thought I should try to catch him to take him for care. I had some food scraps and tried to lure him towards me, but he just kept his distance and he walked faster than I did. We have plowed a few trails for our horses, and Barney (his new name) liked to follow the trails. I put a pet carrier in the middle of one of the trails, with food in it and then proceeded to slowly walk Peregrine falcon swooped down at him (I was very surprised to see a falcon here, and very scared for Barney). Barney just crouched when the falcon swooped in, and when he missed, kept walking. Barney then sped up and took a hard right into the woods, and disappeared. I followed his tracks for a while, but couldn’t find him. I had to go to town for a bit, and was very worried about Barney. When I returned home, I went looking for him as the woods he disappeared into were close to the road. I then saw him walking in the field 1/4 mile away from where we were. He then started walking back home, and walked that distance in less than 10 minutes. When he was almost home, a bald eagle flew directly over. I was amazed to see an eagle here at this time of year as well, as I usually only see them during migration spring & fall. Barney just kept walking and safely made it back to our yard. I realized that there would be no way to catch him, and since I am able to tell my dogs to leave him alone, I decided to take care of him from a distance. Since then we see him every day and we leave out dog food, turkey and scraps. He still keeps his distance, but he seems to be understanding that when we walk out to him that we leave food and he seems to be able to smell it and finds it most of the time. He also has 3 Raven friends that show up every day to check on him. They stay around on and off all day, and one actually walks around the horse pen with him for a while each day. Barney can’t fly, but he can flap enough to get up onto the bush piles in the woods, and then climb up into the trees to roost. No more sightings of Falcons or Eagles, thankfully. It’s been 3 weeks now since he was injured. We are hoping every day that his injury heals and he can one day fly away. Until then, we will protect him as much as possible, send him healing energy and make sure he gets enough food to stay strong. Barney is now a part of our extended family. He often hangs out with the horses, and our dogs leave him alone. He is a very cool bird, and we are honored to have him here, but we would rather he could fly to stay safe.
Update Jan 30 2019. For the last 2 weeks Barney seems to be able to fly a little bit better. He isn’t graceful, but it should help him to stay safe. He still mostly walks around in the horse pen, and all the way around our farm yard every day. His friend Ravens (usually 3-6 of them) visit each day and help him with the oat cleanup in the yard and the scraps we leave out for him each day. I’m sure that once he is healed, he will still stay with us, he knows a good thing!

Category

Other

Species

• Common Raven