This
morning, as I was cleaning up the breakfast dishes, we suddenly heard a loud,
distinctive sound outside.
“Caw!
Caw! Caw!”
Although
it repeated itself several times, we really only needed the first time to
identify exactly what we were hearing. Somewhere, in the branches of one of the
trees outside, was a slick, black bird that we are all oh so familiar with. The
common crow.
We have a
tendency to dismiss them as common, boring, pesky, and even problematic at
times. There’s not much more to them than that. Right?
It turns
out there’s a lot more to them than that.
I could
sit here and quote facts, numbers, and statistics, but where’s the fun in that?
Perhaps
the most fascinating thing about them is something that can't be measured at all.
Their intelligence. Now, I can’t personally prove any of it, but some
scientists are suggesting that crows are among the most intelligent wildlife on
the earth. Some are going so far as to suggest they may even be smarter than
primates. I don’t know about that, but there are some pretty amazing stories
floating around the internet. See how many make your jaw drop.
·
According to some sources, experiments have been
done which demonstrate that, upon being shown how, crows can identify images.
They will be shown an image. In a minute, they’ll be shown two images, one that
is identical to the first image, and one that isn’t, and they will easily tell
you which is which.
·
Some stories claim that crows have figured out
how to place a tough nut on the road so a car will drive over it and crack it
open. Some even suggest the crows will deliberately select smaller cars to keep
the nut meat from being too badly pulverized.
·
One story suggests that a particular captive
crow figured out how to trick a companion crow into looking in the wrong place
for food, so he could go to the right place, himself, and chow down in peace.
·
Experiments have been done that show crows are
capable of recognizing faces. Experimenters will wear a particular mask when
performing certain tasks the crows don’t care for (holding a dead crow, banding
the live ones, etc…), and no mask or a different mask when doing other things.
Eventually, when they show up wearing the “bad tasks” mask, whether they’re
doing anything or not, the crows will become upset. There’s even some evidence
that the crows will teach other crows which masks to be wary of.
·
There’s even one story that says that a crow was
once observed taking a straight piece of wire and bending it into a hook in
order to get food out of a tube.
Again, I can’t verify a single
one of these, but it’s sure something to think about, isn’t it?
What I can tell you is this. There
was a day, about ten years ago, that a relative and I were enjoying a stroll in
a mountain town. Although we were in the well-developed area, the little town
is surrounded on all sides by mountains thick with forest. There’s no place in
that town that you can’t spy wilderness of some sort without squinting.
As we walked, we suddenly became
aware of a ruckus out in the trees. Some sort of creature was racing along the
forest floor full-tilt. It was too far away and obscured by trees to tell what
it was. Only that was it appeared to be running on four legs and that it was in
a mighty big hurry. And who could blame it? Above, a swooping, diving, spinning
flock of crows cawed and hollered as it chased this critter ably off into the
deep wilderness. Probably a coyote or something trying to steal the crows’
eggs, my relative posited.
Now tell me, how would the crows
be able to figure out how to get together and organize an operation like that
if they didn’t have some modicum of intelligence?
Photo by DickDaniels (http://carolinabirds.org/)
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