Like every other morning, the chirp of the cuckoos heralded sunrise that morning too. The visitors on my window began to flock in slowly. The sparrows first, followed by the pigeons, interspersed by the crows and ravens in no particular pattern. That day the ravens were out in their glory since morning. They circled round the trees and screeched loudly, much to everybody's annoyance - especially Bouncy's.
Bouncy is the colony dog. She is a very sprightly animal, full of life. Her merry nature and the ability to jump unbelievable heights led to her being named Bouncy when she was a puppy. The crow & raven fraternity and Bouncy have been at loggerheads for as long as I can recall. In fact, she has been at loggerheads with practically all the birds and even squirrels. She manages to hunt down a pigeon on a good day and makes a sumptuous meal out of it. She, however, does not consider the members of the Corvus family as particularly delicious; so she tries to plainly kill them. They try to peck at her, and caw in unison to tease her. She, in return, barks her lungs out at them and is always on the lookout to catch a few feathers in between her teeth. The brutes in the form of birds irritate her no end, and she chases them around the colony incessantly. This is routine.
That morning Bouncy had managed to scavenge a piece of stale bread for her breakfast. She held it with her teeth like a trophy and looked around to check for any hostile two-legged beings who might intrude her meal. Having made sure none were prowling, she settled for breakfast between a Hyundai i20 and a Honda City. A sly raven had been observing her all this while from a distance. No sooner had she begun to work on the hardened piece of bread than it swooped down adroitly, snatched the piece of bread neatly and flew away. An astonished Bouncy was quick to react, but not quick enough. The raven definitely had the advantage of flight which she could never match. As though it were pre-planned, and it definitely seemed so, the raven alighted on the bird bath at my window. The poor dog was left agape and hungry. The raven held the bread in its claws, at the same time balancing itself on the edge of the bath. It broke off little bits of the bread and dipped each of those bits in water. When the hard bread softened, it was gulped down with ease. Bouncy sure wouldn't want to discuss this incident with anybody, so we'd better keep mum when she is around.
Ravens are omnivorous birds. They can survive on practically anything, be it food grains, fruits, vegetables, other birds' eggs, meat - raw, cooked, stale, rotten - rodents or carcasses. Just about anything. One morning when the ravens were out foraging for food, they came across a dead rat. Four ravens darted at it simultaneously. They wrestled among themselves, each trying its best to grab the rodent. In a few minutes, the mightiest - may have been the shrewdest - raven picked the rat and flew. Not the ones to give up easily - especially a chance to bicker - the other three followed suit. The four birds swooped and swooshed past buildings, cars, trees and people in the quest to claim ownership on that apparently prized bit of delicacy. Nobody knows what ensued in the interim but in a while all the birds had gone back to their nests, empty handed - empty beaked literally. The dead rat was found a little while later resting in the now slushy waters of a certain, much discussed, bird bath on a certain, equally discussed, window.
There were squeals of shock and disgust when this present from the ravens was discovered. The window, and even the room, were abandoned after that. Three people quelled nausea and wondered how to get rid of this rather unsolicited gift. The best option would have been to upturn the bath so that all its contents just fell prey to the force of gravity. There could be people passing under, but that could be taken care of. Somebody could always stand guard to warn them. After a lot of deliberation and discussion, when someone dared to return to the window and peeked into the bird bath, the rat was missing - much to the relief of the entire household. Perhaps the ravens had taken umbrage because their valuable gift was not met with the enthusiasm that they had expected. Or some rascal just got lucky. Quite obviously, it was the latter. Either way was good for us. We were spared the ordeal of cleaning a dead-rat-infested bird bath with mucky water. Messed up, yet a rat-less bath was still a better deal!
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