UKH

Climbing on Clogwyn Du today we returned to our bags to find the zips undone, lightweight contents spread around and all food gone from zipped pockets. A large raven had been seen around the bags earlier. Like the gulls at South Stack, it seems the ravens have learned to open zips and that winter climbers leave food in their bags. The main compartments of the bags were left un-opened. Looks like they haven't worked out how to undo buckles and draw-cords - yet.....

In reply to Pete_Frost:
Oh yes they have! Had contents of sacks strews all over the hillside before... Keep your car and house keys on you!

In reply to Pete_Frost:

We had the same thing happen to us in the bowl below Y Garn last year. Came back to find our lunch intact, our mate's food long gone, and some suspicious looking crows lurking nearby. Very entertaining.

In reply to Pete_Frost:

Also happening at Raven Crag,Langdale - small non valuable items missing - evolution in process no doubt.
Dorine

In reply to Misha:
I'm glad they are being so careful and undoing the bags properly. They can rip open a dead sheep with those huge beaks, so I guess a lightweight rucksack isn't going to be much of an obstacle. Maybe we should leave a sacrificial cereal bar zipped into one pocket, put everything else in the main compartment and hope they don't get too hungry.....

In reply to Pete_Frost:

It's a significant problem when cragging in South Africa where baboons and vervet monkeys pilfer your rucksacks. The former are particularly intelligent when it comes to coping with buckles. Some crags have lockable wire cages supplied by the Mountain Club of South Africa to stash your gear in at the bottom of the crag.

Ravens are intelligent.

In reply to Pete_Frost:

They're nothing compared to the Dewerstone squirrel... He sits just out of reach until the second leaves the floor and rummages through your bags for food whilst you look on helpless... Bloody nut ninja needs a sacrifice to stop him chewing through your zips!

In reply to Pete_Frost:
The robin at Wyndcliffe Quarry today managed to clear up the remains of carrot cake in an admittedly open Tupperware container. We were thinking it must look forward to weekends when the hordes arrive....

In reply to JIMBO:

Yep. He trashed the zips on my rucksack to get at my lunch once we were off the ground and could only watch.

In reply to Pete_Frost:

A friend woke up from his first bivvy on a planned multi-day outing in the Queyras/Mercantour some years ago to find all of his food and his penknife had been stolen by marmots.

In reply to Pete_Frost:

I met a rescued raven at a conservation centre in the Czech Republic. He looked at me in a way I don't think an animal has ever looked at me before, working me out. Everyone walking past kept talking about how scary this giant beast was, but as I talked to him he flew over and wanted his feathers ruffled and beak scratched. He followed me when I moved along his cage and when I eventually left he cried, could hear it for about 5 minutes as I walked away

In reply to Pete_Frost: If they got open the zips in my rucksack they deserve the food,very intelligent bird

In reply to Removed UserStuart en Écosse:


...And now they've got pen knives as well! Time to get worried.

In reply to DubyaJamesDubya:

Are they hooded crows? As you say, penknife and hoody, definitely time to be concerned

In reply to Pete_Frost:
If they crack the internet we are in real trouble.

In reply to purplemonkeyelephant:


Do you look like Noel Fielding? Might explain his interest in you.

In reply to Pete_Frost:

I had this when I left a bag in Cwm Idwal. did an integral followed by an 'unplanned' descent route off the top of the Glyder - when I finally got back to retrieve the bag, long after the crowds had departed, I found the lid pocket open, bits of food disappeared and a hole in the tough, reinforced material on the base of the bag. Always wondered what creature had done this, but a raven fits the 'bill' perfectly...

In reply to coldfell:


Well, that's only fair. It is their crag anyway.

In reply to JIMBO:

Yeah, yeah. Watched him/them attacking our sack while on a multi pitch route. Completely trashed the sack with holes all over it. Bombarded it from the crag with loose rocks, but failed to deter it. Thought afterwards should have hung it in a tree - that'd sort a squirrel, wouldn't it.

In reply to JIMBO:


I keep hearing this, but in around a dozen visits to the Dewerstone I have only once seen a squirrel, it was nowhere near anyone's bags. I think this is a myth.

In reply to Skip:


It's not a myth - it's a known risk associated with bouldering
https://www.ukhillwalking.com/forums/t.php?t=675176&v=1#x8685157

In reply to purplemonkeyelephant:
I know what you mean. I saw a very sick-looking raven one morning last year in Camp 4; over the course of an hour it got worse and finally stopped moving. It was attended all the time by a number of other ravens who came and went. When it became unresponsive one of them bought food and tried to feed it. They pecked at it gently before I took the corpse away from camp so other people wouldn't interfere with it.

These are very intelligent creatures, totally unlike us. Their lineage is closer to that of dinosaurs, different parts of their brain perform higher cognitive functions to mammals and they even have different kinds of colour receptors in their eyes (mammals had to re-evolve colour vision after spending aeons being nocturnal). If we ever meet intelligent, off-world aliens the experience may be like that of looking into the eyes of a raven: strikingly similar but utterly different.

In reply to Pete_Frost:

I usually leave an offering on my hill walks, either where I stop to eat or at the summit. A part of a bar, some nuts...In my personal mythology, birds are the guardians of the hill and are just amazing creatures, intelligent and intriguing.

Sometimes I bring bird food with me for distribution at the parking spot, which will usually be patrolled by a mix of birds.

In reply to Skip:

I've had at least 4 rucsacs gnawed open, from 1975 on. Either there is a Methuselah among squirrels there or, more interestingly, the skill has passed down the generations