![flock of raven flock of raven](http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-UtetHXqdkxk/VJSKHgZ-eCI/AAAAAAAAu00/UxEEbq6ct3o/s1600/374_1r2raven_10_7x7.jpg)
He was hit by a car outside the Black Sheep restaurant. “If I fell off one of these cliffs,” he said, in a tone far more cheery than morose, “they’d eat me.”īefore Gus and Lisa, there were Bob and Huey.īob, a crow, came first, around 1998. He doesn’t make a habit of touching them, though he calls them “his.” They “yap and flap,” Boufford said - their soar is not as steady as a raven’s, and they call out a piercing “caw.” The distinctive raven song is a lower, croaking “raaawk” that seems to be punctuated with a question mark.īoufford emphasizes that these are wild birds, not pets it’s against federal law to keep a raven as a pet. Ravens are larger, about the size of a red-tailed hawk, according to the Audubon Society.Ĭrows are more likely to fly in flocks. Sometimes, Diana said, she goes, taking photos while her husband delights in shooting and narrating video.īoufford easily distinguishes ravens from crows, their cousins in the corvid family, which also includes jays, rooks and magpies. Moro and her mate are to the east.īoufford admits that he pesters his wife of 43 years, Diana, to go to Crystal Cove even more during the spring because he can never get enough of the ravens’ flight training. Gus and Lisa have a more secluded westerly expanse.
![flock of raven flock of raven](https://www.sortra.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/crow-raven-tattoo-design-ideas205.jpg)
Harold and his mate have arguably the best territory, encompassing the Crystal Cove cottages, cafes and the area where Boufford helps children make their sea glass crafts. Boufford thinks the birds are using the mate changes to redistribute territory, but he doesn’t know if it’s voluntary or if they’re wired to do that. Lately, the “remarried” birds have been holding uncharacteristic powwows with Gus and Lisa, crossing all three couples’ established territories. Maude disappeared three years ago, leaving her mate, Harold, to raise a brood solo. “They’re excited for the day,” Boufford said. The birds are especially energetic in the morning. Then he gets his usual breakfast burrito and watches the birds some more before his jewelry class. He takes a morning walk every Wednesday from the ramp below Lot 4 to the Shake Shack, looking down for sea glass and up for ravens. Now there are only three, he said, drawing his finger along a map in a kiosk at Parking Lot 4, across the Coast Highway from Newport Coast Drive. They have presence.Ībout 10 years ago, he recorded six couples along the 4-mile Crystal Cove beachfront. They filed his face away as their waiter and decided he was trustworthy, he said.Ī raven is “a little bit like a cat, a little bit like a dog and a lot like an owl,” Boufford said. That’s how Boufford got the attention of the ravens, which will eat dead animals.
![flock of raven flock of raven](https://i.pinimg.com/originals/91/da/3f/91da3f09051063ac624857d64e7757cd.jpg)
“It’s magical.”īoufford’s father was a forest ranger who taught him to toss roadkill off the pavement to keep coyotes and other scavengers from getting hit by cars. Ravens fledge at about five to six weeks and test their developing wings with midflight tuck and rolls. His observations tell him that eggs will appear around March and hatch in about three weeks. They glide above him, loosely tracking.Īfter decades of quiet, patient study a short drive from his Newport Beach home, the lay ornithologist with the nickname “Raven Rick” has gotten physically close enough to the resident specimens to spot differences - a misshapen foot, an unpigmented patch, a hooked bill - and differentiate characteristics that direct their behavior, allowing him to recognize them at any distance. He’s not a formally trained expert, but he knows their quirks. Moro, Edgar and Lenore, the Pips and the Jets over the last 20 years.Ĭlever, emotive, athletic, inquisitive and brimming with mystique, ravens are territorial and nonmigratory and form deep pair bonds, allowing bird fanciers like Boufford to study the same birds for years. Rick Boufford has watched brood after brood of common ravens tended closely by “his” birds, the ones he has called Gus and Lisa, Harold and Maude, Mr. It’s the time when the ravens learn to fly. The enchanted season is approaching at Crystal Cove State Park.