Listening to a Continent Sing

the companion website to the book by Donald Kroodsma

COMMON RAVEN ID-344

Lolo Pass and Powell, Idaho

June 9, 7:13 a.m.

Sunrise at 5:44 a.m.

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A common raven croaks. What a joy to hear those deep croaks, at first a leisurely burst of four, then two more, then two and three and two, if one is counting, then five, then two, and two more, and I always seem to count. The raven then changes its mind, perhaps based on what another raven says in the distance (0:48), for it then shifts to another call, one distinctly higher and of an entirely different tonal quality. He tends to offer three of them at a time, but ends with just one.

It's just a small sampling of all this raven can do.

Background

A distant raven. Warbling vireo, black-headed grosbeak (at end). What is that jumbled song first heard at 0:05, then again at 0:16, 0:27?? It sounds like a Canada warbler to me, but I didn't think that they occurred this far west.