Just before noon, I was on a Teams call with a customer in my home office (where else?) and noticed some motion out of the corner of my eye. Thankfully my webcam was off and I was on mute so I was able to investigate without anyone noticing.
Turns out the motion was a rather large crow (let’s call him/her Cameron) sitting on the eavestrough poking away rather violently at something in the trough near the downspout. After a few pokes, Cameron pulled out a rather limp and sad-looking rat and spat it out, back into the gutter. But Cameron didn’t fly away.
Sensing I had my daily photo in the bag, I quickly reached for my X-T3 (which thankfully had the 16-80 zoom lens already mounted), poked it between the slats of Venetian blinds (there was no time to raise them and I didn’t want to startle Cameron anyhow), composed, and started shooting.
Cameron kept on poking away at the rat (was it still alive? I thought crows only went after dead animals…), picking it up and spitting it out, until finally Cameron seemed satisfied with the grip it had on its quarry and posed triumphantly for a portrait before flying off.
I am now afraid to see what else lurks in my eavestroughs…