The Last Adventurer

Other Grand Canyon Tips:

Watch your spoons: Several years ago, we were at the Grand Canyon during the second week of June. We arrived late in the afternoon, and waited in the dry heat for the harried campground ranger to find us one of the remaining campsites that were still available. Our car, our tent, and everything else were stuffed into a small site that was stuck between two immense R.V.’s. We didn’t care about the location because we were just happy to get a spot. The next morning, we woke up at the crack of dawn so that we could see what permits were available at the Backcountry Office. We had oatmeal for breakfast, as well as some hot coco. After breakfast, I went over to the car to get my sponge to clean the dishes. As I reached the car, I heard the sound of scrabbling talons; and I had the distinct impression that I was being intently watched.

I turned around quickly. Our campsite had three things in it: our tent; a firering full of ashes; and a standard metal picnic table that was chained to the ground to prevent theft. I had left the dishes alone and unattended on the table. The table now had the dishes, and three new diners atop of it. The new diners were three of the large ravens I had seen while walking around the campground the day before. These ravens were some of the most confident birds I had ever seen. The day before, I had watched them briefly, strutting around the gaps between trees in their cocky hopping manner. They had been unfazed by the assorted humans that had waived various implements at them to scare them off; and had not even deigned to fly at such threats. Now, sensing another opportunity for a free meal, they had occupied our table.

I froze. The rearmost raven froze too. His inky bright black jaunty eyes stared at me with boredom. He cocked his head in my direction. Nonchalantly, he stretched out his wingspan. I had to admit that it was impressive. He was probably close to being about eighteen inches tall, and was clearly, very well fed. Once he saw that I wasn’t going to feed him for his display, he indignantly folded his wings. His two comrades weren’t interested in posing for photos – they were interested in scavenging. They continued to step around the table, peering into empty metal bowls and plastic cups. I wasn’t concerned – I knew there was no food on the table. I also knew that I was going to go back to the table once I had my sponge which would cause them to scamper away, unfed. That was my plan. It didn’t solve the problem about animal habituation to humans; but at least it didn’t contribute to the problem.

Suddenly, the first raven seized an empty plastic spoon in his beak. I still wasn’t concerned. At best, there were a few licks of oats on the plastic. I watched him more or less “beak” the spoon for a second before I decided that I was going to intervene. After all, it probably wasn’t good for a raven to be chewing on a plastic spoon; and it probably wasn’t good for my spoon to have all sorts of beak gouges in it. I took a step away from the car, intending to shock the bird into dropping the utensil. My action had the opposite effect: the second raven picked up the second spoon that was on the table. I took another step forward. The ravens - as a group – and still with the spoons - all took a collective step backward. We had a standoff.

I knew that they weren’t scared of me. And I wasn’t sure what exactly I could do to make them scared of me. I also didn’t really care if they were scared of me; I just wanted them to realize that the spoons weren’t edible and that they didn’t really want them. There was also an alternative to scaring them – I could bribe them. I had plenty of food in the car; it would have been easy to waive a piece of bread at them to get them to come to me, and drop the utensils. I didn’t like that idea because it would only encourage their hostage taking behavior. It also seemed a little ludicrous to be more or less, negotiating with a gang of birds over plastic spoons that I owned.