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> Each volunteer was either holding a dead crow, standing near a dead red-tailed hawk—a crow predator—or standing near a dead red-tailed hawk holding the dead crow. I had to reread this about 5 times to make sense of it. Am I just tired from a long work day or is that a poorly phrase sentence?
holding a dead crow, standing near a dead hawk, or doing both at once.
If you find this interesting, you should really look into the intelligence of crows. They've been observed to remember human faces, wait on traffic lights, plan, and a whole bunch of things that are very impressive. And don't even get me started on _jackdaws_.
Corvids (crows, ravens, magpies, jackdaws) are pretty bright. Some of them also have quite a bit of voice control. Like parrots, they can speak human words if trained. https://youtu.be/rIX_6TBeph0
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You realize you're not supposed to toss around garbage in the national park?
Biodegradable apple cores that he was feeding to birds? I think that hardly qualifies.
edit: it's also illegal in national parks, carrying up to a $5000 fine and six months in jail
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Is there any evidence this isn't fake?
He does sound a little like a voice synthesiser, but I think that's mostly because both birds and computers speak English poorly. Here's another example: https://youtu.be/AfsnHVaScjg
EDIT: you can even hear it in their natural calls, they have a buzzing, saw-like texture in the upper-mid and high range.
I believe ravens and crows are very similar, this is a personal (long, and not the great) story about a raven I messed around with in Yosemite National Park: When I was up on north dome (not to be confused with half dome) there was a group of raven's hanging out on the rocks watching us eat our late lunch. I had an apple core that I tossed to the side and watched as a raven warily tried to approach it. I walked over…
You realize you're not supposed to toss around garbage in the national park?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Okay, so these are the kinds of things that definitely need a citation ;) In what sense do you mean reading minds? Genuine mind reading, or basically a kind of intuiting about human intention based on say, body language?
Sorry, no citation. Just my personal knowledge and experience. And it's not just reading body language, but actual reading your thoughts. In the case of the crow, what body language tells it that the guy is about to throw a piece of rock or a bone when it can't SEE the object? I know it's not something I can prove to you, but that doesn't mean it's not happening.
So I decided to give a try to get more disciplined. From past to months I wake up at 5 am for gym, and have a routine life. Now none of the crows notice me :).
My explanation: These crows can sense how people live and behave. And they found out I was very odd in the community. :) :)
The location the match was being played at had a standard pool and a shallow junior pool right next to each other. During the match a wild attempt to score a goal missed the side and the ball smashed full force into a crow who was drinking water from the junior pool. This of course resulted in the poor crow's death. But what was amazing was that within a few minutes, every other crow in the vicinity had surrounded the dying crow and then decided that they would attack the spectators and the players. We had to clear the entire stadium and pool for a good half an hour till they allowed us to return (although they left their dead comrade behind who had to be cleared away by a hapless cleaning staff member).
One less impressive story but still relevant to the article. We had an antique air rifle at home that needed repairs. My uncle who did such repairs said he'd come along and look into it. That evening there were plenty of crows around as usual. Most of them were in the trees two houses away. I assume these were crows who had forever lived in urban areas and probably never been shot at let alone seen a gun. They've lived through plenty of fireworks and don't seem all that bothered by them whenever they do go off. But when I brought the gun out to show to my uncle, the ruckus caused was utterly deafening. And just like that, silence. Every single crow had scattered from the area. How they recognised an object like that and so instantly is a question and memory that has stuck around with me forever.
Amazing creatures who annoy me with their never ending din and tendencies to somehow make a mess of any garbage bag left out in the open, but they'll always have my absolute respect for their intelligence.