crows making tools
Jul. 3rd, 2004 02:54 pm
I meant to post this a while back, but forgot to.Some months back Betty the New Caledonian crow caused a stir when she demonstrated extraordinary tool-making intelligence. She spontaneously created a hook out of wire in order to get some food. Go to http://users.ox.ac.uk/~kgroup/tools/tools_main.html to read more about this and look at the short (1.2Mb) video there showing her actually doing it. At first she tries to get at the food using a straight piece of wire, and at one point almost manages to, but she soon realises this won't work and bends the end of the wire into a hook to lift the food container up.
crows using tools
Date: 2004-07-03 06:40 am (UTC)Crows are very smart!
Re: crows using tools
Date: 2004-07-03 04:15 pm (UTC)Crows are wonderful. I've watched them playing.
Where I live we have some very smart members of the crow family -- butcher birds. They display their intelligence in a number ways; the most impressive is their complex and variable, warbling song and other vocalisations. Another is their speedy learning ability. They are very friendly. Yesterday I was standing on my balcony talking on my cordless phone and a butcher bird flew down and landed on the railing easily within arm's reach watching me inquisitively. This was a wild bird! The are incredibly curious.