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Three amazing Crow stories illustrate the intelligence of Crows. Amusing crow stories introduce the trickster crow, the talking crow, and the feathered problem solver.
In my last article The Intelligent American Crow, I promised to share a few stories illustrating the intelligence of crows. Here are three amazing crow stories.
Clarence Stevens recounts two amusing crow stories in his book Birding in Metro Halifax. (Nimbus, 1996). The first, related to Stevens by Linda Payzant, a Halifax birder, describes a clever trickster (page 78): a crow, observing a Gull eating something on a rooftop, sneaked up behind the gull and plucked at its tail feathers. When the gull turned, the Crow retreated, then advanced and pecked again when the Gull returned to its meal. The Gull turned again; the Crow retreated again. A third time, the Crow pecked the Gull's tail feathers and the Gull lost patience. Forgetting the food, it flew at the Crow, but the Crow was ready: flying up over the Gull and swooping down, the Crow claimed the prize and flew off.
Stevens' second story is about his own father and a talking crow (pages 117-118): Steven's father was out looking for a lost cow early one morning on Cape Sable Island, a small island at the southern tip of Nova Scotia. Cape Sable Island is often socked in by fog, and this was one of those mornings. As he was checking the fences, our hero distinctly heard a voice say: "Hello Walter." He looked around but, seeing no one, decided he was hearing things and carried on with his search. A second time, he heard the voice: "Hello Walter." This time, he saw the speaker - a crow sitting close by on the fence. The situation was altogether too much for him, and he raced for the shelter of a warm house and the company of people. He later learned that a local man by the name of Walter had taught a crow to talk.
A third story, about Carrion Crows in Japan, is recounted in the Firefly Encyclopedia of Birds (Ed. Christopher Perrins, Firefly Books Ltd., 2003, page 486):
the Carrion Crows of Sendai City, Japan, have access to a supply of walnuts but have a tough time cracking them open. These feathered problem solvers, however, have found a solution. The clever birds perch on traffic lights with walnuts held in their beaks. When a red light stops the traffic, the birds fly down, position the walnuts in the path of the traffic and return to their vantage point. The light turns green, the traffic resumes, and the walnuts are crushed by tires passing over them. As soon as the light turns red again, the Crows return to the pavement to claim their food.
Now do you believe Crows are intelligent?
Read a first-hand story of a pet crow: Ralph, an Unforgettable Pet Crow
The copyright of the article Amazing Crow Stories in Birds is owned by Rosemary Drisdelle. Permission to republish Amazing Crow Stories in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.
Comments
May 23, 2006 7:53 PM
Joy Butler :
Yes, I believe! But then I already knew it! :) Thanks for sharing these
amazing stories.
Jun 13, 2006 9:45 AM
Jennifer W. Miner :
My dad told me he read in a magazine, that someone took in a crow with a
broken wing to nurse it back to health, and once it recovered it just
became a family pet, wih freedom privileges. One day, out of nowhere, the
crow said, "Does Hammacher Schlemmer have a toll-free number?"
Amazing, the article said, because this is doubtless something that was
only said ONCE in the household! :)
My old pet parrot could learn a
thing or two from crows.
Jen M.
http://luxuryresorttravel.suite101.com
Jun 14, 2006 2:40 AM
Rosemary Drisdelle :
I bet that if crows were decked out in bright flashy colours, parrots
wouldn't have a chance - but parrots are lovely too (and much rarer in my
neighbourhood).
Jun 14, 2006 1:28 PM
Joy Butler :
This thread reminds me of Victor, the parakeet, that I wrote an earlier
article about. His owner is involved in research about birds talking in
context. Pretty interesting.
http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/extraordinary_animals/106602
http://www.victorsarchives.homestead.com/indexring.html
Jun 15, 2006 4:06 AM
Rosemary Drisdelle :
That's an interesting article! I've seen other stuff about dolphins,
elephants, and other animals (not speaking, but communicating and
displaying evidence of emotion and intelligence) - and anyone who owns a
dog knows that there's more going on than stimulus/response. It seems that
once upon a time someone decided that since animals don't communicate like
we do, they don't communicate - or think. The idea really stuck.
Feb 9, 2009 12:11 PM
Brenda Winfield :
I believe too! Crows are wonderfully intelligent animals. We have a
beautiful white crow in our neighbourhood in Castlegar, British Columbia,
Canada. He has a black beak and partial black head to just past the eyes,
and black feet. But the rest of him is snow white - very beautiful. I got
a great photo of him just a couple of weeks ago when he was in our yard.
Can we post photos here? If we can, I'd do so, but I don't know how.
Brenda from www.fractal-art-adventures.com
Feb 18, 2009 10:24 PM
Guest :
The best crow story I ever read about was in the paper but I can't remember
when or where. At least 20 years ago. It was true to the best of my
knowledge and utterly amazing. It seems a family's pet puppy had
disappeared and they searched everywhere for it. They put out his favorite
puppy chow every day hoping he had just gone exploring on his own for a few
days.. he never came back but they noticed that each day a crow would come
and pick up one or two small bits of the dog food and not eat it but fly
off into the woods that bordered their home. They finally got curious and
followed the crow to see where it was taking this food. They found their
puppy caught in a wooded trap that had been set for rabbits .. the puppy
was alive but only because after over a week, the crow had been picking up
the food and taking it too the puppy and dropping it in the cage for him to
eat. This was found because their was puppy chow still in the cage and they
say the crow actually drop his dog food to the pup. Amazing. I had a pet
crow as a kid. Not mine but flew around the woods around our house. He
would come down and eat oatmeal out of my hand. land on my head. etc. He
was incredible to me. A neighbor bully killed him and did it on purpose. I
found him as he was dying in the woods. His look to me said one thing
" I know you had nothing to do with this". I never forgot the
forgiveness in his eyes. I wrote a story about this. A bit of creative
nonfiction. If anyone is interested in reading it. write me at :
raynbojg@gmail.com and I'll send it too you.
7 Comments
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May 23, 2006
