We had the most amusing thing happen at my job today.
There’s a little area outside the back door of the kitchen at the retirement home where I cook, where the employees who smoke go to … smoke.
I was busy in the kitchen, and one of my female coworkers came running in saying, “I need bread!” She grabbed a heel of bread and ran back outside. Naturally, I had to follow to find out what was going on.
It seems that, while three of these smoking women were smoking, an unusually friendly crow decided to come join the party. When I went outside, this crow was perched on the back of a chair. And he/she was completely fearless. The damned bird just sat there looking at us. My server joined us a moment later, and was able to actually walk over and pet it. She even let it nibble on her finger.
But this crow was also a smartass. He hopped down next to the ashtray, grabbed the ashtray with its beak and flipped it over. Then he spotted a plastic drink cup with a couple straws … he grabbed the straws, yanked them out of the cup, and flinged them aside.
It was almost like this crow had been somebody’s pet. It had absolutely no fear of us. When I sat down to “smoke” (I quit smoking a while back; now I “smoke” an eCig), he danced around my feet and acted like he wanted to jump up on my knee. It was funny how he wasn’t at all interested in the bread my coworker was tossing to him (though he made a spectacular mid-air catch of one piece she tossed … and then spit it out). But he became very interested in me. Possibly because I smelled like meat.
I’ve sent a Facebook friend request to one of my coworkers, because she took photos of this crow with her phone. I want those damned pictures so I can share them here! This crow was too much.
I bet he was someone’s pet at one point. They really are such cool birds. When I was in high school and for a little while thereafter, I worked as a zookeeper. We had two crows and a raven that had been pets before being confiscated. Since they couldn’t safely be returned to the wild, they came to us. They were so much fun to watch. I used to stuff the crows food into these little balls (Similar to this, but they unscrewed Lattice Balls 1.5 Inch (Per Ball) | On Sale | HealthyPets). They’d have to hold the ball in one claw and reach in and grab the food with their beak. After about a week of this, they figured out that if they stuck their beak in one of the holes and shook their head they could open the balls and get all the food at once.
If I had to pick favorites, though, I would have to pick Brad, the raven. We thought he wouldn’t eat unless he was handfed. He’d readily eat from your hand, but never from his dish. I used to spend at least half an hour a day feeding him. He’d take food from my hand until his craw was full, then go into his nest-box for a couple of minutes and come out crying for more, repeating this over and over. Eventually, I realized he was hoarding his food. Rather than eating it when he went in his box, he was hiding it to save for later. I used to feel so sorry for him because he wasn’t eating that I’d give him all sorts of extra fruit for treats and I think he must’ve realized he got better food from people than from his dish.
I know that crows are extremely intelligent. I mentioned that this crow was rejecting the bread that my coworker was giving it. It wasn’t regular bread - it was raisin bread, full of sugar and cinnamon and raisins. It turned out that this crow had a more extreme sweet tooth. It had found a discarded candy bar in the lawn. Chocolate, and all that. Once it was able to extract the candy from the grass, it picked up the whole candy bar and flew away.
They aren’t just a little smart, they are among some of the smartest animals in the world by some measures. Even chimps can’t figure out some of the types of problems they can solve.
Here is one solving a rather difficult 8 step challenge.
Some of them can even talk and maybe even read a little:
I love crows. I volunteered at a wild bird sanctuary a long time ago, we had a cage of crippled crows (try to say that 10 times fast) that was my favorite stop at the place. They were all used to people, you could go in the cage to feed them and they’d come up to you and hop on you. They were playful and a couple of them talked.
Crows can identify individual people. If you’re kind to a crow, give it food, and basically treat it with kindness yes, it will interact with you and not fear you.
If you hurt a crow not only will that crow mistrust you forever more, he/she will also let all the other crows know you’re a hazard.
Not only that, they seem to have a language complex enough that they can describe you to others in their murder. If you are mean to a crow, expect to get yelled at by a bunch of crows. And by those crows’ grandchildren, even if they had never seen you before.
One of my truck drivers walked out of my office at a previous job and swore that a crow outside had said “hello” to him. We made great fun of him until the crow also said “hello” to several other people in the office.
It was a light manufacturing place surrounded by rural homes and gardens and I think the crow was being fed and friended by someone in the local area, and just decided to come over to the plant one day. Never heard it say anything but hello, but it definitely could say that.
Corvids can articulate rather well. They have two sets of vocal apertures, complete with lip-like closures, inside their tracheal branches. I think that is why that one crow in the tree out there right now can sometimes sound like several of them.
[QUOTE=Broomstick]
Crows can identify individual people. If you’re kind to a crow, give it food, and basically treat it with kindness yes, it will interact with you and not fear you.
If you hurt a crow not only will that crow mistrust you forever more, he/she will also let all the other crows know you’re a hazard.
[/QUOTE]
Will they ever use you or your car for “bombing target practice”?
I can attest to both of these points. I used to sit on a balcony at lunch time and would share my leftover lunch with a crow. He learned that when I lit up a cigarette, I was finished with my lunch and would fly over and land on the table to get his share. Its possible that he guarded “my” balcony, because on the rare times other people sat out there, they would get yelled at by a crow.
Another time, in a different state…I accidently live-trapped one. As soon as I got home and saw it, I let it out unharmed. (it even ate all of the bait in the trap, so it wasn’t deprived of anything but its freedom for a couple of hours) It never forgave me, and did indeed tell its friends because I couldn’t go outside anymore without getting harassed by crows.
When me and my friends visited the UK about 10 years ago, we got to tour the Tower of London. The guide told us there was a legend that if the ravens ever left, the Tower of London would fall. Then we got to see the ravens. They were the size of turkeys. Apparently their keepers feed them so much food, they can’t fly away. Thus London is saved.
Their favorite food is sheep hearts. One or two have on occassion gotten away. I saw the keeper of the ravens talk about one flying away and getting caught in Greenwich a few days later.
I love crows. They’ve been a favorite of mine for many year. Recently we’ve had an influx of crows in our neighborhood. As a result, they’ve driven out the pigeons - Yay!