While birding Union Reservoir that was largely devoid of birds yesterday, we happened on a corvid foraging in some pine trees. Our first impression was crow-sized but with binoculars we could see a raven tail, bill and chough. The bill and chough were not quite up to what we expect Common Ravens to look like so we were thinking maybe a Chihuahuan? Inez suggested we play Raven songs on her i-phone to see how it would react. First she played Common Raven and almost immediately the bird in question came back with what sounded to our ears an identical phrase. Ok-good!! problem solved. Then Inez said, " well let me try the Chihuahuan song." Again we got an immediate response, again, to our ears, identical!! Then the bird gave us a baleful look and flew to another pine tree in the distance. Quoth the Raven-" That's all you get, its your call". We never figured out what it was finding in the pine trees either. It foraged at the base of the needle clumps and came out with something fairly sizeable then it would fly to a more stable perch to eat, it took several bites to finish.Of course, yesterday was John's birthday and he may have just been giving us something else to keep us thinking! (A cowbird showed up at our feeder for the first on so-far only time in mid winter the morning after he died). Bill and Inez Prather, Longmont
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