Common raven

Where does the common raven live?

Home: in mountains, forests, coasts and towns.

In the wild it lives in these countries: Norway, Sweden, Finland, Russia, Canada, the United States, Iceland, Spain.

Conservation status from the IUCN: not in danger.

The short profile

Fully grown: about 54–71 cm long. It weighs about 1.2 kilograms. On the menu: both plants and meat.

The story behind it

A raven is much bigger than a crow, with a wedge-shaped tail, shaggy feathers on its throat and a beak strong enough to open the skin of a dead deer. Ravens live almost everywhere in the northern half of the world, from Arctic tundra and high mountains to desert edges and city rubbish tips. They eat almost anything: dead animals, insects, grain, berries, eggs and scraps left by people or by wolves. A raven hiding food watches to see whether another raven is watching it, and will come back later to move the food somewhere safer. In one famous test, ravens pulled a long string up with beak and foot, loop by loop, to reach meat hanging below a branch. They also play, sliding down snowy slopes and dropping sticks in the air to catch them again. A pair holds the same patch of land and usually stays together for life, talking with a whole set of croaks, knocks and bell-like notes.

Find it on the globe

Common raven is there as a tiny animated figure that breathes and looks around. From far away the planet is only a blue ball; detail arrives as you zoom in, and this one appears once you are close enough. Open it on the globe.

It sits at its real coordinates, not near them — the same numbers listed in the facts above. Switch off the layer for this kind of place and it disappears again; the buttons for that are down the right-hand edge.