Animals are certainly more sophisticated than we used to think.
And we shouldn't lump together animals as a group.
Crows and chimps and dogs are all highly intelligent in very different ways.
Alison Gopnik
Mankind has a long and checkered past with crows and ravens: They have been feared as
symbols of death, revered as creators of the world, and worshiped as trickster gods.
Often the subject of dark fiction, they are highly intelligent.
Intelligent enough, in fact, for us to start worrying ... Let's get started.
10.
Corvids, the genus of the crows, can be found all over the world except southern S. America,
the Poles and various islands.
They are believed to have originated in central Asia and species diversity is still high there.
The oldest corvid fossils have been found in Europe from 20-25 million years ago; from
an ancestor called the Miocene.
9.
Mating crows will often remain together for years and some until parted by death.
Crows often exhibit “cooperative breeding behavior” which means that they watch out
for the mom while she’s incubating, and they all help feed the babies until they’re
self-sufficient.
Some offspring even stay to help out with the next batch of babes.
8.
Crows are considered song-birds and posses a deep repertoire of melodies.
And, like humans, the more melodious the song, the more soothing the effects.
Some crows have even been taught to recite opera.
Ravens can be taught to speak basic human language.
Pet crows give their owners names.
This is identified by a unique sound they make around specific people that they would
not otherwise make.
7.
Crows have an excellent memory.
They're masters at stashing food in many caches, moving it sometimes two or three times, and
remembering exactly where they placed it.
Their brain-to-body ratio is equivalent to that of a chimpanzee and amazingly, not far
off that of a humans.
Oh, also?
They can recognize different human faces.
Recognize and react to them.
Researchers in Seattle, Washington captured seven crows while wearing masks.
After they released them, the crows remembered the masks and attacked them whenever they
saw them.
If the researchers wore different masks, the crows didn’t pay attention to them.
As soon as they put the offending masks on though, the crows started cawing and swooping
at them.
6.
Crows are omnivores, which means they eat nearly anything.
Crows have been reported to eat over 1000 food items, including insects, worms, berries,
birds eggs and nestlings, small mammals, bats, fish, snakes, frogs, salamanders, animal dung,
grain, nuts, carrion, fried chicken, hamburgers, Chinese food, french fries, and human vomit.
They can be weirdly picky though – an experiment showed crows prefer French fries in a McDonald’s
bag over those in a brown paper bag.
To top it off, a nestling can eat 100 grasshoppers in 3 hours.
5.
Crows living in suburban areas require only 10% of the nesting territory that crows living
in in the wilderness do, and are much more tolerant of range overlap.
They also will build fake nests to fool predators.
Attempts at extermination in past have included dynamiting of winter roosts.
However, the crow remains abundant, and is increasingly adapting to life in towns and
even cities.
4.
Crows have been observed chasing sparrows into buildings in order to stun them.
The result is sparrow for lunch.
3.
The crows of Queensland,Australia have learned the skill of grabbing and eating the toxic
cane frog.
The crows flip the frog at its back and start stabbing its throat with their long and sharp
beaks, thus consuming the non-toxic innards.
2.
Crows have the ability to judge the character of human beings by reading their faces and
expressions.
1.
Almost all corvids artfully use sticks to pry grubs from wood.
They care for their tools and fashion new innovative implements.
A New Caledonian crow named Betty stunned the scientific establishment in 2002 when,
in an experiment at the University of Oxford, she was seen bending a piece of wire to make
a hook with which to retrieve food from a tube.
Well, there you have it, fun facts about the highly intelligent crow.
Maybe the crow still isn’t your favorite animal.
That’s all right!
But just remember one thing.
The crows will find out about this.
And when they do they will find you, remember you, tell their friends about you, and FASHION
TOOLS TO TAKE YOU DOWN.
If you liked this list, the crows demand you like and subscribe.
And as always, catch ya next time.