Ken's New Friend

Meet Blackie.  I’ve been waiting to introduce you to him, in hopes that I could get some more “chummy” pictures of him with Ken.  That isn’t happening, so hopefully this post will have an addendum at some point with a picture of Ken with a crow on his shoulder. 

One of the first things Ken noticed when we moved in this neighborhood was a crow with a broken wing.  Of course he couldn't fly, so was confined to our neighborhood.  Ken named him “Blackie.”  Blackie was usually in sight of our apartment.  We would observe how his family (three other crows) would watch over him.  We would see them bring him food.  So Ken started taking meat scraps out to him. Ken does a certain whistle and then puts meat scraps or bread for the crow.  But Blackie is wary and won’t approach the food until Ken goes back inside.  Ken did this for quite some time.  Blackie would definitely take notice when he would hear Ken’s whistle and would watch intently as he put the food out. 

  Then the snows came.  Heavy, amazing snows.  And Blackie disappeared.  We don’t know where he went, but we feared he had met his fate.  But his three friends were still around, so Ken kept putting out food.  He noticed they would come get the food and take off with large amounts in their beaks.

Then, when the snow started to melt and things warmed up a bit, Blackie was back.  He is around again now.  So are his friends/family.  Ken continues to feed them, but they still won’t come near him.  So where did Blackie go during the blizzards?  We can only assume that he found shelter somewhere and that his friends/family continued to bring him food.  It’s really quite amazing when you think about it.  We’ll keep you posted!

Blackie's friends/ family watching over him.

Blackie's family.

Ken putting out the food.  This was before the heavy snows came.

Blackie eating the food.