As I pass through the cemetery on my dog walk there’s a couple of crows who often hang around in a certain corner.
In an attempt to befriend them, for the past year or so I’ve been making loud sort of crow noises and leaving a dog treat or two on the top of the same gravestone in the hope of them associating the strange human skwawks with a gift. A few days ago I nearly gave up bothering as it’d never worked but didn’t want to risk it
The crows were not around as is fairly common.
I put a couple of treaty crumbs in the usual spot and when I was about 20 metres further on I checked back and there it was, a gorgeous beautiful crow
Yesterday was the same. No sign of the crows, skwawk, leave treat, skwawk, give Dolly a treat cos she’s cottoned onto it by now. Check back and there’s the splendid beastie again!
I was buzzing all the way home. I’m going to go again soon
I'm in Canada, if that makes a difference. Ravens, in particular, are year long residents and stick around for the winter even in extreme subarctic regions. I had a colleague at the Canadian Wildlife Service who write regs on migratory birds check into the federal level regs for me and it would be fine.
It's the city regs that don't work. Apparently there are vestigial laws regarding keeping pigeons though, dating to messenger pigeon eras...