Despite their grim collective noun (surpassed only by the Ruth Rendell-ish “a murder of crows”) and croaky demeanour, I love ravens. Big, clunky, with a wedge-shaped beak and a throaty croak, Corvus corax principalis are a dominating presence in the woods and mountains of the west and north.

Fabulously smart, I’ve seen them steal eggs from a crate in the back of a pick-up truck and jimmy open cardboard boxes to find food inside. In one town in the Yukon, ravens were known for flying off with golf balls from the local golf course, and then dropping the balls randomly in the woods, where hikers would find them later.

Of course, they’re mythic: stories from around the world endow them with godlike status. But my favourite thing about ravens is the way they talk and call to each other: whistles and deep-throated croaks that reverberate through the woods, and a really weird “water drop” noise that I try to imitate by clicking my tongue against the roof of my mouth.

But perhaps the best part of our co-existence with ravens is our emphatic uneasiness with their presence in our lives. Uncompromisingly dark and brooding, carrion-feeders, and perhaps smarter than we like to give them credit for, ravens have inspired awe and fascination for humans in almost every continent. But leave it to our dear pal Poe to immortalize this “bird or devil” forever, in endlessly irritating repeating rhymes:

Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken!
Leave my loneliness unbroken! - quit the bust above my door!
Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!’
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.’

(Image: John James Audubon)