Ravens in Hollywood

Fashion raven / fitheach fasantaOriginally uploaded by AlasdairFitheach.

The billboard reads “hip has found a home” but I’d call that “chic” wouldn’t you? Anyway it is about nesting season, so maybe this raven is considering a condo down the street. I’d been taking pictures of it for a few minutes, and it decided to take a closer look, flying in a circle over me at about 20 feet up, literally eyeing me up and down before returning to the billboard. The only other ravens I recall doing that live nearby in Runyon. Below, the same raven in a small pine a few yards from the billboard. It was awfully close to street level for a raven, and possibly the unusual behavior of human triggered some awareness that something strange or new was going on. It hopped three nervous neophobe hops on the billboard before flying over to take a look at me. They are used to humans paying them no notice at all here. A human actually peering at them and taking pictures has to be a novelty - something out of the ordinary in a very ordinary and predictable environment.