You probably know the feeling. Those life’s little ironies when you strive for something long and unsuccessfully, only to finally come to the only possible conclusion: you stop trying and wait until it eventually happens on its own, at an unexpected moment. That's how it was for me with filming ravens.

During a shoot for Czech Television in 2016, I spent dozens of hours in the winter sitting near the carcasses of animals, where all sorts of scavengers feasted, mainly buzzards and white-tailed eagles. The whole time, I was hoping ravens would land in front of my camera, but those crafty creatures have a reputation as some of the most cautious birds for a reason. There were times when five enraged buzzards would be fighting over a dead deer, but the ravens would just circle suspiciously in the air and never land. Oh well, tough luck. I gave up on the idea, thinking that maybe someday in the future, I’d build a better hide and capture them there.

But eight years have passed since then, and I’ve practically stopped filming in the winter. There’s simply no time due to editing footage. As a result, I kept missing out on my dream of filming ravens feasting... Until this spring when something finally changed.

At the end of May, my friends Dušan and Janek and I went to our favorite location to check on nesting woodpeckers. We didn’t find anything particularly interesting that day, but on the way back, we suddenly heard a sharp cawing from a nearby meadow. We peeked out from the forest and saw six ravens tearing apart the carcass of a young fallow deer. They had nearly devoured it; only a few bones were sticking out from the thick grass. The birds were so full that they didn’t even fly far away—they sat on nearby trees, loudly calling out and waiting for us to finally leave. A strange scene, as ravens rarely behave like this...

It was already evening, the sun was slowly touching the horizon, and a crazy idea popped into my head. What if I came back here in the morning, still in the dark, and tried my luck? The night would fall soon, the ravens wouldn't have much time to eat, and by dawn, there might still be some meaty morsels left on the bones. My friends thought the idea was foolish because it was supposed to rain at night, and the chances of success seemed slim. But something inside told me that I had to be sitting here with my camera in a few hours. On the way back, I pretended to be undecided, but it was already clear that an adventure awaited me in the morning.

When the alarm dragged me out of bed at 2:30, I doubted my sanity a bit. On these tough nights, though, you can’t overthink things. I sleepily sped through the empty landscape, and by 4:00, I was already sitting camouflaged with my equipment in the middle of the forest.

Suddenly, all the rush stopped. It was still pitch black. Raindrops gently tapped on the roof of the tent, but the thrushes in the surrounding trees were already slowly starting their morning concert. Holding my breath, I listened to the sounds of the awakening forest and waited for dawn. When I finally began to make out the ribs of the dead deer in the dim light, a raven called out from afar. Another one joined in nearby. Suddenly, the unmistakable sound of black wings cut through the air, and I knew that several large birds had perched on the larches right above my head. “I don’t stand a chance,” I thought. “They’ve never landed in front of my camera before, so why would they do it now? They’ll check things out, fly away, and I’ll go home empty-handed again.”

But my instincts hadn’t led me here for nothing. In today’s video, you can see what unfolded before my eyes around five in the morning. And that was just the first taste...

To be continued 😊

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✿ Species
Common raven (Corvus corax)

✿ Location and date
South Moravia, Czechia | May 2024

✿ Equipment
Panasonic S5II
Sigma 60-600
Zoom F3
Sennheiser MKE 600

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Common raven | Corvus corax | Krkavec velký |
Kolkrabe | grand corbeau | cuervo grande |
corvo imperiale | Во́рон

#europeanwildlife #commonraven #corvuscorax