Several weeks ago, the Ravens' equipment staff received a package in the mail containing what appeared to be a tiny pair of jockstraps. What the heck, they asked, are we supposed to do with them?
Eventually, someone got word to Gabrielle Dow, the team's vice president of marketing, who told the equipment staff that it wasn't a mistake. They were actually tiny diapers, and the team needed them to outfit two new ravens, not two new Ravens.
Birds. Not football players.
Rise and Conquer - two West African ravens - were purchased by the team recently as part of a partnership with the Maryland Zoo in Baltimore, which will oversee their training and care. The birds will be a prominent part of the team's pre-game festivities and will also make regular appearances in the community.
Although the team did have birds named Rise and Conquer who took part in pre-game festivities, those birds were owned and trained by an Atlanta couple who contracted their use for home games. They had to travel the 575 miles between the two cities for each appearance.
The team couldn't come to an agreement with the birds' owners to continue the relationship, and the original Rise died recently of disease in the ankle joint. Because the birds were so popular with fans, especially kids, the Ravens began to look into acquiring a pair of mascots who could live in Baltimore full time.
The Ravens soon found out they couldn't actually get an animal license in the state of Maryland, so they reached out to the Baltimore zoo, which agreed to form a partnership with the team. Amy Eveleth, the zoo's Embassy Collection manager, agreed to find a pair of baby ravens and train them to interact with people, because the ravens the zoo already owned were far from friendly.
So far it has worked out extremely well. The birds, who are brothers, were born April 16 in Alabama, and Eveleth began training them in Baltimore when they were around 7 weeks old. Rise and Conquer will make their public debut at a news conference today at the Baltimore zoo and attend their first Ravens game Sunday when the team opens against the Kansas City Chiefs. The birds will likely also be on display at the zoo as part of every Purple Friday, in the zoo's Basecamp Discovery exhibit.
"I think the really neat part about it is that the birds are home," Dow said. "Now the fans can see them, and kids can see them when they go to schools. That's what's so important about Amy. Now we're going to train them to be friendly, to be in the public eye, and to see fans on game day. Our fans can be near them and feel their presence."
