A few years ago I was walking my dog Georgie in North Vancouver and as we approached a large tree, I became aware of the raucous cawing of a large group of crows.

Suddenly, Georgie was being dive-bombed by a dozen or so crows and the din became louder and more frantic as we got closer to the tree. Georgie was being attacked from every direction and she didn’t know what to do! Sure enough, I soon spotted a juvenile crow on the ground that was in the process of learning to fly and was at that moment quite vulnerable. Georgie and I changed direction and the crows’ aggressiveness immediately stopped.

The crows were merely doing what nature intended for them to do: protecting their young. They will fearlessly try to frighten away any creature that comes too close, and that is a beautiful thing.