Interesting article in Scientific American, April - may be the source of the Spiegel article.

I always thought ravens were warning me of approaching predators when they made a fuss in the bush, but apparently they were telling predators about me, so the ravens could get an easy meal!

I've always liked ravens, even though they can be incredibly annoying. There is a flock (is it a murder of ravens, like crows, or what?) (according to this site, it's an unkindness of ravens - wild!) of them at the lake and they cruise around making the weirdest noises and clattering on the roof.

They tease Turko mercilessly, hopping around until he spots them then soaring off just before he gets to them, landing in a branch above his head and squawking at him.

But they are beautiful in a way with their glossy black feathers and bright eyes, and they are undoubtably very smart.

The neighbour has enough of a lawn that he can practice his golf shots. The ravens started swiping his golf balls and, since they were old ones, he let them. They got up to about 50 balls before he gave up, and we tried to imagine some poor female raven sitting on a whole nest full of "eggs", trying to get them to hatch.