Two days ago, Jackie went into full egg protection mode when a group of ravens decided to pester her while she was on the nest. The ravens swooped around the nest and even landed on both the front porch and the back porch, trying to scare Jackie off of those eggs.
But Jackie was ready. She hunkered down over those eggs, squealing at the ravens to get away. When a raven got too close, she wing-slapped the nest, showing that raven that she means business and she will not allow it anywhere near the nest. And she set a new record for the number of wing-slaps in one event—16 times!!
She chortled a message out to Shadow to come fast. Shadow answered from a distance and soon flew into the nest, chasing ravens away. Both Jackie and Shadow shouted at those circling ravens for a long time. The ravens would not give up easily but finally left the area.
Shadow stayed at the nest with Jackie the whole time. He huddled close as Jackie protected the eggs. Finally, when all was clear, Jackie stood up and Shadow immediately took her place over those precious eggs.
When Jackie came back from her well-deserved break, she brought a huge, complex stick with her. She landed it on the nest and worked to turn it over to get just the right angle to grab hold and find it’s location…but that silly stick did a flip-over on its own and fell right off the edge of the nest.
Poor Jackie watched it fall and apparently felt so disappointed about losing that stick that she let out a few mournful squeals. As she then took over egg-sitting, Shadow chortled softly at her…perhaps with a little promise…
…And he soon came back with a giant catfish to make Jackie feel better. It even had the head still intact and he put it right on her back to make sure she knew the whole thing was hers.
After her nice lunch, Jackie was able to settle back in on the eggs, probably feeling much better.
Sandy

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