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DiSesso, a 29-year-old sign painter who lives in Pacoima, California, finds people paying good money, nowadays, for the same thing that caused his teachers to toss him out of school. He and his trained raven, Jim, Jr., have earned more than $2,000 in the last two years by giving exhibitions.

"And if you'd change that $2,000 into dollar bills, they would fill a couple of bushel baskets," says DiSesso.

He acknowledges that he has perfected the art of training birds considerably since his boyhood days, when he used to "ditch school" to tramp into the woods hunting wild birds which he captured and trained.

Training birds requires, first of all, a real interest in them, he says. Birds are smart and they sense any make-believe interest.

"I can't remember when I haven't enjoyed training birds," he declares. "When I was twelve, I trained some baby finches to sit quietly in the branches of our Christmas tree. I never will forget the surprised look on the visitors' faces when the ornaments moved and flapped their wings."

Another requirement is patience—patience in finding the right birds with the greatest possibilities, and more patience in training them. "So what if you do spend several years in finding and developing a gifted bird like Jim, Jr.," says DiSesso. "Ravens live as long as fifty years, and this one will get better as he goes along. So what can you lose?"

His proud owner says that Jim, Jr. is probably the only raven in existence with a bank account.

Pointing to the spanking new truck out in the driveway, DiSesso will tell you that it is being paid for with the $2,000 earned with exhibitions. No wonder the truck proudly carries a large picture of Jim, Jr.

IT CAN be accepted as a general rule that very young birds are the easiest to train. In fact, it is advisable that you procure chicks not more than three weeks old. Both males and females train well, depending a great deal on individual birds and on the amount of time you spend on them. It is, for this reason, always best to keep them near you when you're around the house or yard.

DiSesso keeps his young ravens in a series of cardboard boxes in his sign-painting shop next to his house. Here he feeds them ground horse meat three times a day, while he keeps up a running banter with them, and at feeding time he has special calls for them. Baby ravens can tolerate extremes of temperature very well, so it is not necessary to keep the shop especially warm for them. Crows and ravens are not molested by insects, such as lice and fleas. They are also singularly free from disease, and are inexpensive to raise.

By the time they are two weeks old, the rows of blue-gray pin quills on their wings have changed to feathers. They stand and flap their wings and caw loudly. Bathing the baby ravens is no problem, for they should not be bathed until fully grown at twelve months. Then you bathe them by gently playing the hose over them or by placing a big pan in the yard on a sunny day.

"When they get to know you so well that they think you are their mama or papa, when they know every inflection of your voice, then you can begin training them in obeying hand signals and get results," says DiSesso.

This usually happens after three or four weeks. By this time they will have graduated into small homemade cages. These may be about three to four feet long and two feet wide and high. A perch may be placed on each end near the bottom and far enough from the sides to allow room for the bird's tail.

Later, they may be put into larger cages about eight to twelve feet long, if you have space in your back yard. By this time they can be given the freedom of the yard during the day. Ravens and crows may be left outdoors the year around, in all climates, in spots sheltered from wind and dampness.

DiSesso advises handling the young ravens as often as possible now for this makes subsequent training easier. It also helps you to select the most promising birds. In addition, birds trained this way will not fly away.

BEFORE ALLOWING your pet raven or crow full freedom of the yard, cut five flight feathers on one wing. When he gets really to know you and his yard you may let them grow in again. He now likes you too well to try to fly away.

The first hand signals the birds learn are the "come and go" signals. You place them on the floor, several feet away from you. You slap your hand and say, "come," repeating it often. For "go," you use a sweeping hand motion away from you, and of course, any success is rewarded with food.

After three or four weeks the birds will begin to obey hand signals without being rewarded with food. DiSesso says that while all ravens and crows can learn these first signals, only about one out of fifty is capable of learning stunts. The others he sells to neighbors with young children for anywhere from $5 to $10.

"Children from four years on up like crows or ravens as pets," DiSesso says. "They are as good as puppies to guard a child, or to play with him. They often make playmates of the puppies too, sharing their house and food."

A crow playing in the yard with the children, will give a loud "caw" when something unusual happens. They enjoy chasing balls with children, and they make good all-around household pets. Children enjoy teaching them new tricks too.

"But the birds teach the children a thing or two also," says DiSesso. "Ravens put their toys away. The top shelf in their cage is usually filled with bright treasures they picked up in the yard."

RAVENS ARE the largest members of the crow family. Their plumage is a deeper, glossier black than that of the smaller crows. The Mojave Desert, where he often visits relatives, has provided DiSesso with many crows and ravens. They are also found along the seashore in northern latitudes and in mountain areas.

Most pet shops dealing with all breeds of birds carry baby ravens and crows during the spring and summer seasons. They may be bought for around $15. You will have the advantage here of selecting a young bird related to stock that is known to have produced birds of a comparatively tame disposition. A number of breeders specialize in such birds. Experience has shown that birds with inherited abilities are much more apt pupils than those indiscriminately selected.

Contrary to general belief, which probably stems from Edgar Allen Poe's poem, "The Raven," these birds are not really somber, solemn or sinister. Poe, with his flair for the dramatic, probably found the deep black of the raven's feathers a necessary prop for his poem and thereby convinced thousands of people that "black feathers make black birds."

That is not the case, DiSesso assures us. On the contrary, they are very affectionate and likeable birds. In addition, they are crafty, resourceful, adaptable, quick to learn and wiser than owls. And when you find one like Jim, Jr., they are also very profitable.

Where did he get Jim, Jr.? "One day I watched Curly Twiford, who trains animals for the movies, perform with his animals," DiSesso relates. "He had cougars, eagles, hawks, coyotes, rattle snakes, screech owls and ravens."

DiSesso was impressed by the ravens and bought a clutch of five eggs of deep blue-green, splotched with dark brown flecks. They were the size of bantam eggs, so he put them under his bantam hen to hatch. Only two did. Jim, Jr. was one of them and the other was named Pete.

Pete was the more promising bird at first, the one DiSesso set his hopes on. While he was training Pete, Jim, Jr. merely stood around and watched. Then one day while Pete was going through his paces, Jim, Jr. joined him in the "coming and going." He kept this up day after day and soon began showing real talent in learning stunts.

Today, Pete acts as an understudy to Jim, Jr. Each has his own cage, built by DiSesso in his back yard. His cages are about four by five by seven feet and are made of scrap lumber and chicken wire. They are large enough for DiSesso to enter when he works with the birds and they contain several roosts and various pieces of mirror.

There is a reason for the mirrors. If the ravens get used to seeing themselves in them, they never peck at you. They have a reputation of pecking at people's eyes, and they do that because they try to fight the "other bird." But ravens who are used to seeing themselves in mirrors just know better. Or at least eyes don't interest them.

PETE AND Jim, Jr. are still being fed horse meat three times a day. To vary the diet, they occasionally get an egg and table scraps. They especially like fresh greens and fruit, with an occasional treat of a piece of fresh corn cob and a drink of milk. It is best not to give them candy, cake or coffee. Their keep costs him about 25 cents per week per raven, DiSesso says. "And where can you get cheaper pets than that?" he asks.

DiSesso asserts that breeding is responsible for some of Jim, Jr.'s superiority, for his father, Jim, was a highly trained raven. Perhaps that is why he has gone farther than any other raven DiSesso has tried to train. It took him only a little while to learn the "pull" command. For this, a shiny piece of wire or a piece of white string was placed on the floor with one end hidden. You pull the hidden end and curiosity makes the raven go up to the string.

After Jim, Jr. had practiced thirty minutes daily for several weeks on a piece of string, DiSesso built up a story around the trick. The patter would always include the word "pull." Some stunts based on the pull command are untying shoe laces, combing hair, pulling the string on a dummy stick of dynamite, picking tiny clothes pins off a doll clothes line, pulling handkerchiefs from pockets and pictures out of wallets and many other tricks limited only by your imagination.

The important thing, says DiSesso, is to build up these tricks with stories which come natural to you and to build the tricks on things the bird likes to do.

When Jim, Jr. is on stage he thoroughly enjoys showing off his tuxedo and top hat. At the onset of the act, he'll strut around on a card table while the audience is getting settled.

Then DiSesso says, "Come on Jim, you've shown off your fancy pants long enough, let's go to the bank. How about depositing this money for me?" Jim, Jr. picks it up with his bill and blithely deposits it in a toy bank. The audience rarely notices the quiet "come and go" signals and assumes that the bird understands every word that his owner says.

After demonstrating his various tricks, Jim, Jr. has his costume changed to a pretty blue and white pinafore to "show how he helps Mrs. DiSesso around the house, by taking the clothes off the line." Then he flies to a chair and perches on its back while receiving his due applause.

DISESSO'S FIRST paid exhibition was a show he and Jim, Jr. put on for a dinner given by the Sportsmen's Club, a group of Douglas Aircraft employees. Nearly 300 attended and they paid DiSesso $50 for the performance. A friend of his was a member of the club and got him the engagement.

Newspaper publicity resulting from this brought other engagements. These included shows for Kiwanis and other service clubs, lodges, store and market openings and community fairs.

At intervals, they do free shows for veterans' hospitals, Boy Scouts, schools, charity shows, church entertainments and others. These usually bring more paid engagements.

Occasionally, Jim, Jr. is asked to appear in a movie or on a TV program. Fees for these performances run a little higher, from $35 to $150. He has appeared in such movies as "Cisco Kid," "Golden Blade," "The Robber Crow," "Androcles and the Lion," and also in a TV show called "Robin Hood." Since movie and TV engagements are few and far between, however, Jim, Jr.'s earnings come mostly from local engagements.

In addition to these profits, Jim, Jr. has helped his owner build up his sign-painting business. When customers come into the shop, his winning ways often help land a contract. When DiSesso is out on a job, Jim, Jr. sometimes sits on the ladder and throws in a free performance, thereby building up much customer good will.

While parakeets, canaries, parrots and lovebirds are more popular, DiSesso says he likes ravens and crows because they are "more of a man's bird."

For lovers of parakeets and smaller birds, he recommends a training book called "Parrot Family Birds," by Julien Bronson. This contains chapters on parakeets and other talking birds. In addition, there is a chapter on crows and ravens. This book is published by All Pets Magazine, Fond du Lac, Wisconsin, and can be found in most public libraries.

"We have gained many new friends through Jim, Jr.," says DiSesso. "For one thing, when we go on a family picnic in Sunland Park, people always come around to watch him.