I like the fact that they are so ... observant. A specific crow (I recognize him due to the missing feathers around his collar) will spend a while sitting on a tree outside my window, observing me for no reason. I do feed them generally by leaving peanuts in a specific area in the backyard early in the morning, and I'm sure this one partakes in the feast; but I have never rewarded his presence in any form, and yet there he is, in the middle of the day, just hanging out on the branch of the leafless tree, just sitting there, observing me. If I turn around and make eye contact, he often flies away. But I can see him in the reflection on my ipad's screen, and if I don't turn around and make eye contact, he will stay there for a while.
It is fun interacting with "smart" creatures who have their own personalities and active social lives.
oddsockmachine
I was told (by my partner, who works with birds in many capacities) that they consider a "direct" or head-on look to be something of a threat, as a predator would do. Consider looking at them sideways, with only one eye -as they would to each other- and see if it makes a difference.
veunes
That would explain why they sometimes seem perfectly relaxed until you look directly at them
gwerbin
I did this with the rabbits in my yard. They would always freeze and then bolt when I looked right at them. So I started getting closer and closer to them without making eye contact, and then they started to get much more comfortable around me and my family. Now they don't tense up and run away whenever I happen to get near, which I think is nice, keeps them less stressed out while they destroy all of my native wildlfower seedlings.
soupspaces
Something as simple as stepping on a twig, brushing on grass, the crumpling of a plastic or some kinds of clothing can be enough. It makes sense, since their bodies are much more fragile and distance is easy. Their ears are almost like ours internally, with different structure.
veunes
The iPad reflection trick is hilarious. You are basically observing him observing you while carefully pretending not to observe him.
spike021
sounds like my dog. he knows when to sit and stare at me to wait for his usual food routine and, occasionally, treats. once he realizes that no it isn't time for either, he goes away.
9dev
Mine will just sit somewhere else where he thinks I surely must see him now, and lick his lips when I look at him just to make a point. Sometimes I wonder if he’s considering hitting me with his bowl because I’m obviously too stupid to understand his super obvious question
unsupp0rted
What else is he gonna do? Our ancestors spent a lot of time around observing things because the days are long and there’s no WiFi.
dinfinity
Isn't he just checking/waiting for the food to come out? If he's the first to it, he gets the best haul.
mlmonkey
The food comes out early in the morning (8AM). This guy I often find watching me around noon. So the food has long been consumed and forgotten.
devilbunny
As a natural night owl who works at a job that starts at 6:30, I wish I could still całl 8 “early”.
We exposed wild crows to a novel ‘dangerous face’ by wearing a unique mask as we trapped, banded and released 7 –15 birds at five study sites near Seattle, WA, USA. An immediate scolding response to the dangerous mask after trapping by previously captured crows demonstrates individual learning, while an immediate response by crows that were not captured probably represents conditioning to the trapping scene by the mob of birds that assembled during the capture. Later recognition of dangerous masks by lone crows that were never captured is consistent with horizontal social learning. Independent scolding by young crows, whose parents had conditioned them to scold the dangerous mask, demonstrates vertical social learning.
kobalsky
This is tangential but our monk parakeets make a special sound when they see something they don't like. We have learned to identify it, and hilarously, our dogs did too.
Now when they see something weird (recently, a bird of prey in street light they saw through the window) they sound the alarm and the dogs go absolutely crazy.
vanderZwan
> and hilarously, our dogs did too.
Tangent to your tangent, but this is one reason why a guard llama works so well together with guard dogs for protecting livestock.
A llama is much more alert to potential danger than, say, sheep. Which actually is an understatement: sheep have the added problem of not making any noises when attacked or eaten by predators, and therefore not alerting guard dogs.
Dogs can teach themselves to interpret the llama's body language and pro-actively chase away coyotes or foxes or whatever it is that the llama spotted.
I've seen this in action on a family friend's sheep farm.
That is fascinating. The parakeets are basically providing an early warning system, and the dogs have figured out enough of their "language" to subscribe to it.
devilbunny
My in-laws had a Chihuahua as the alert dog and a Doberman as the guard dog. Yip yip yip WOOF WOOF WOOF. Took the Dobie on a lot of walks in natural areas where sketchy people were around. Funny enough, nobody tries anything when you have an 85-lb/40 kg dog. They saw me put her on a leash when I saw them and they knew I could just drop it.
card_zero
There's a more complicated example with fork-tailed drongos and meerkats. The drongos can mimic the meerkat alarm calls in order to panic them at strategic moments (and swoop in to take food), along with a high percentage of genuinely helpful alarm calls to keep them malleable.
veunes
What gets me is that it is not just "crows remember faces". Apparently the information can outlive the original encounter entirely. You can end up on the neighborhood crow blacklist without some of the crows ever having met you before.
Melatonic
Apparently they can also tell other crows if they like you. Or their car. There's reports of them chasing off other birds away from people they like (and their vehicle or house).
tescreal
What does scolding look like in crows? Sincere question.
oasisbob
Extreme example, but it's harsh, noisy and they'll sometimes aggressively swoop down at you.
Probably sounds like more than looks like. If it's what my cat gets, it's crows posting up on trees and roofs and talking shit at you.
tescreal
Usually I find them demanding me give them food. Shame on me for forgetting snacks!
UI_at_80x24
And most importantly they teach their offspring about the dangers!
Frieren
> Even when humans have a friendship—or something that feels like it—with a crow, the relationship happens on the wild animal’s terms. They visit when they want to, and they may disappear from our life suddenly.
It goes also the other way around. I do not leave a note to my neighborhood crows when I move town.
I think that it has nothing to do in which terms it happens but the communication barrier. It is very possible that the crows signal that they are leaving for good but we are just missing the message. And my reason to not leave them a note is because they cant read, if they could I would.
mikestew
I don't know the answer, generally speaking, but we've got a pair that pop onto the back fence every morning waiting for their peanuts. I think they're multigenerational, as I have reasons to suspect that the "original" Mr. Peanut has passed on. Anyway, the bold one will come sit with me in the front yard. When I walk the dog, they'll follow me for a bit, flying a few feet off the ground right in front of me, I assume to make their presence known and get a piece of dog biscuit (which I oblige). They have never gotten obnoxious about it by crowing at me, just silently hanging around: "if you could spare a bit of dog food, kind sir..."
Friends? It's probably transactional from the crow's POV, but OTOH they hang out on the fence and just sit sometimes even if there are peanuts on the ground. I enjoy seeing them, though. I will say, though, that after many pounds of peanuts not a single one of the little bastards has ever brought me a present, as is advertised. :-)
e40
We have crows we feed. They sometimes will come to the back door and caw really softly. Clearly it’s a “hey, I’m here, can I have sone peanuts?” It feels really nice when they do that.
Lerc
We have quite a few birds around our house and it has been quite gratifying to see how much they accept your presence after a while. While making coffee yesterday morning, there were three tauhau hopping around in the tree outside the window, less than a meter away, unconcerned. If I go outside they'll keep to about 2 meters. When I'm working in the garage, a piwakawaka often comes in to watch me. If I'm digging in the garden there are a few (I'm going to guess starlings) that watch me digging in the garden close enough I'm surprised they don't land on me. As soon as I stop digging, they're in the dirt rummaging for what I might have turned up. Collectively they have all decided that I'm not out to get them so just go about their business. Except for the piwakawaka, which does seem to go out of its way to just watch me make things.
It possibly helps that I have a dog that will not tolerate a cat on the property and seems to believe that birds don't exist.
bee_rider
From a bird’s point of view, large mammals must be interesting. You are just doing a little digging in the garden, but it’s an absolutely tremendous amount of earth you’ve moved compared to their ability to dig.
I’m always curious about animals’ perception of us. I think they don’t really have the concepts of things like doors, lids, etc, as constructed devices that are made to be manipulated. I wonder if they think we’re very clever at getting into things. And does the dog worry every day that we won’t find food?
xg15
What I find interesting to think about is how much more routine viewing things from high above must be for birds than it is for us.
Looking at a city on Google Maps with satellite mode on was already a revealing experience when it came out.
Now imagine a live view of that with everything moving, as part of your regular environment.
I wonder if smarter birds (such as corvids) might have developed some sort of understanding of the large-scale organization of our cities, or how road and railway networks function. Not because they somehow figured out human civilization but because they literally see those things right in front of them every day.
bob1029
> I think they don’t really have the concepts of things like doors, lids, etc, as constructed devices that are made to be manipulated.
Crows are fascinating creatures. My wife read that they will chase hawks and eagles away, so she started putting food out for the crows near the tree where they gather (we have chickens and ducks that we don't want the hawks near).
Now they bring trinkets as gifts and leave them near the tree. We also had a crow in the past that would make barking noises when it saw our dogs and freak them out. I'm convinced it was messing with them.
e40
I have seen many times a group of crows harassing a hawk. They are unrelenting. OTOH, I have seen a hawk eating a crow. It’s a delicate balance of power.
roughly
A friend is someone you’ll spend time around given other options. If you’ve spent any time getting to know crows (or jays, or any other corvids), it’s quite obvious this is the case. I had a scrub jay who’d perch on my foot while I read in the morning. I considered him a friend, and by that standard, he me.
HappMacDonald
I have been lead to believe that blue scrub jays have a lot of different vocalizations but the only sounds I've caught out of them over the past 15ish years of paying attention have been the raucous shouting shrieks they seem so fond of doing. I perceive this as their species equivalent of cursing xD
lelandfe
How folksy. Give that jay a hat and we got a Disney movie cooking.
roughly
Tbh the jay would be more likely to eat the hat than wear it. He also was extremely clear that the bounds of our friendship did not include me touching him at all, but he’d usually just peck my finger, not actually fly away.
Terretta
This author has their own AM radio Americana narrative style with peculiar flourishes repeated throughout, but it's so refreshing compared to LLMs it's worth slowing down and noticing how they play with the language as the crow does a shiny wire, resulting in far higher perplexity at each bend in phrase than the machines seem capable of no matter the prompt.
tyjen
A murder of crows lives about 200 m away and whenever a predatory bird enters their perimeter, they swarm it until vacates the area. Everything from osprey, hawks, vultures, and eagles, they leave Great Blue Herons alone though.
I don't want to go out of my way to befriend them, because they may harass people who are not me on the property.
Avicebron
They are, until a murder takes up residency in a tree outside your apartment in Emeryvile. Then they are cool roommates you have to get away from else you lose your sanity.
forbiddenvoid
The park across from our apartment in Cupertino was the morning gathering point for every crow in the Bay Area. They showed up at about 3:30-4:00a every day. It was as loud and obnoxious as you might otherwise imagine.
Now, in Seattle, we just have a nice family of three crows that hang out on our balcony on a daily basis. I much prefer this arrangement.
e40
It may seem like every crow from the Bay is there, but that’s very unlikely. Their territory isn’t very large, typically a 100 acres.
Gatherings are very noisy affairs, and that amplifies the numbers.
dylan604
Or is it the roommate that always brings his friends over totally disregarding your personal space? Same result though
Aboutplants
We started feeding a small group of crows that hung out in our neighborhood but after a while decided to back off to only occasionally because their constant presence kept other types of birds away from our backyard.
They are very talkative and I often banter back and forth with them saying hello when they occasionally visit now and have taken to showing up when I take walks to squawk at me and i assume to say hello. Very fascinating creatures
I also tell my young daughter to always be nice to them, because they will pass information not only among themselves but also down generations.
ggm
the article gets my up vote for at least admitting some bird scientists think a lot of this may be projection (one I am also fond of making) and that crows are a lot less into us than we might think.
littlekey
This is cool. Makes me wonder what could be done to foster the friendship aside from food. Are there any sorts of games/activities one would could play with a corvid solely for mutual entertainment? And would the bird think of it in those terms?
fmajid
They forgot to mention the most famous corvids in mythology, Odin’s familiars Huginn and Muninn
marshray
I can't believe they left out Gothi and Gethli in Children of Memory by Adrian Tchaikovsky.
fmajid
Well, I only just purchased Children of Time and haven't even started it yet
petcat
The crows around my house are generally cool unless I do something they don't like and then they'll remember my face for all of eternity and mob me whenever I am outside.
kylecazar
They can pass grudges against individuals down to their offspring. Could be looking at generational animosity if you really displease them.
Aboutplants
Just give them some peanuts, they are pretty easily converted to appreciating you if you give them what they like
dylan604
There's a crow that sits on top of our fence and yells at my cat. The cat is of no threat to the crow. Not speaking crow, I'm not sure if the yelling is angry or just talking loudly. There's no flapping of wings or extending to look big. He just stands there a very obviously crowing at the cat. The cat in no way feels threatened and just lays there. Not sure if his inner monologue is "ugh, this guy" or not, but that's what it looks like.
the_af
Out of curiosity, what can you do to upset a crow so much? Shoo them?
(Where I live there are no crows, please excuse my ignorance. Only common pigeons, as filthy as they are dumb, and they don't seem to hold a grudge, or think much of humans... or at all).
wyrdcurt
Interesting fact you may or may not already know: the pigeons most commonly found around human habitats are feral domestic pigeons. They generally aren't bothered by us because they're bred not to be! Corvids on the other hand are 100% wild (which makes their interactions with humans all the more fascinating, imo).
From the article: "One study found that, between 1941 and 2004, there were just 207 reports of pathogens transmitted from pigeons to humans – anywhere in the world. In all, there were 13 recorded deaths. The true number may be higher, but it would have to be off by several orders of magnitude to compete with the scale of infections from other domesticated animals – particularly some of those with more favourable reputations."
the_af
Oh, I don't think pigeons spread disease. I just think city pigeons are filthy and poop all over everything. Frequently mutilated, missing toes or whole limbs. Also frequently run over by cars.
I like the kind of wild pigeons you can see outside cities. I reserve my contempt for city pigeons, which I like to call "flying rats".
I also like crows, but there aren't any (that I can see) where I live. I've seen them in other locations, of course.
card_zero
The missing toes thing seems related to the existence of polyester thread and similar strong synthetic fibers. I'm vague on why they encounter it a lot - does it make attractive nest material? - and as to why they can't get it off their feet, well I guess pigeons are bad at untying knots, but from what I've observed tangling with constricting fibers looks like the mechanism of action.
drop_star
We have problems here with crows destroying lawns to dig up grubs.
A local sod farmer told me they shoot one and leave it dead in the field. All the other crows show up for a crow funeral and when they leave they dont come back. They remember the crow that died there and treat the area as dangerous.
AngryData
If grubs are numerous enough for crows or moles or anything else to invade your lawn, the grubs themselves would have killed your lawn.
Ive seen it so many times on lawns "Oh no the moles are killing my yard, what do I do?" "Buy grub control" "I bought mole pesticide and traps instead because I don't care about grubs, what are these giant dead spots in my yard now?" "Grubs, because you killed the only thing suppressing the grubs."
mikestew
We have problems here with crows destroying lawns to dig up grubs.
If you're in the PNW, those invasive grubs were going to destroy your lawn anyway.
Nothing grows in my lawn. Everything grows like mad in the non-lawn areas.
sejje
You have big shady trees? That'll make it hard to grow grass.
Some trees put out a chemical barrier to growth, as well. Red Cedar and Black Walnut do it around here.
WalterBright
Interesting. The main trees around here are douglas firs, cedars, maples, hemlock, and madronas. Come to think about it, quite a variety. They all grow without any assistance. They're murdering the cherry trees I planted, which don't do very well.
sejje
My uncle had a bunch robbing his stationary (dog) feeder. So he shot one and hung it above the feeder.
It solved the problem.
b112
While there are times crows need to be dealt with (see the horrors of Chatham, Ont + crows), those grubs eat the roots of grasses.
So you can let the crows have your grubs, or the grubs your grass.
squidbeak
How dare their need to feed spoil a lawn's appearance...
drop_star
Well its a sod farmer so its his livelyhood. Im pretty sure if crows were eating your pay cheque or the food out your kids mouth youd shoot them too
squidbeak
Any excuse to kill something, eh? Tell me, in the free market where a competitor was eating into your paycheck, or threatening the fast food supply to your children, would you head over to their HQ packing heat?
NoItsDanger
I feed them all the time and they recognize me.
They love chicken strips which feels wrong. But they like what they like.
They may become the primary intelligent species of the planet some day - since the evil LLM will never be able to predict their communications and will not be able to wipe them out
moron4hire
Perhaps new levels of transcendant coexistence could be achieved through the use of bird qualudes.
jibal
"seems" does a lot of work here. But rational analysis tells us that, whatever the relationship is, it's not friendship.
annoyingnoob
There has been a flock of crows in my parents neighborhood for decades. They command a large area and push out many other birds, especially birds of prey. They are noisy and annoying. When I visit mom with my dog, they swoop at my dog. Honestly feeling like the neighborhood would be better without them.
brcmthrowaway
In Australia, they attack random people.
patall
Australian magpies are not really related to the crow familie (which includes magpie).
And, from my experience, don't atteack random people but those that got to close to their nest. Whatever their definition of close is.
kraken_cult
This is just crow slander, they're magpies. So corvids, but not crows. And the people are walking under their nests.
I believe crows can be more aggressive than ravens, maybe because they hang out in bigger groups rather than pairs. I haven't heard about it being limited to Australia, though.
We only have a couple of species of crow and if you're on the east coast then you're pretty much guaranteed to be seeing ravens. The crows are in the centre and the west coast, in the dry parts.
SamuraiLion
I mean; they cause no harm unless you are a farmer or something, do they?
vjvjvjvjghv
They poop on people they don't like. I used to work at an office where you had to walk under some trees from the parking lot to the entrance. There was one guy that got pooped on at least once a week. Then he used an umbrella which they pooped on too. No idea what he had done to them but they clearly didn't like him :-)
Another thing I saw at a park: The crows surrounded a swan. One would pick at the swan's butt. When the swan turned around, another would do it. It looked like they bullied the swan for entertainment.
the_af
> They poop on people they don't like
That's not so bad! That alone makes them better than pigeons, which simply poop on everything (sidewalks, cars, people, other pigeons) regardless of any personal animosity or lack thereof.
soupspaces
Was he consistent with his timing? Perhaps so were the birds with their necessities. Or his travel route intersected a convenient location for them. More birds, too, makes a collective vendetta unlikely. Birds tend to be indiscriminate when the world is their toilet.
Terr_
> It looked like they bullied the swan for entertainment.
On the subject of cruelty in animals:
> '[...] humanity may come to terms with the dwarf, the troll and even the orc, terrifying though all these may have proved to be at times, and you know why this is, Drumknott?'
> The secretary carefully folded the duster he had been using and looked at the ceiling. 'I would venture to suggest, my lord, that in their violence we recognize ourselves?'
> 'Oh, well done, Drumknott, I shall make a cynic of you yet! Predators respect other predators, do they not? They may perhaps even respect the prey: the lion may lie down with the lamb, even if only the lion is likely to get up again, but the lion will not lie down with the rat. [...]'
We exposed wild crows to a novel ‘dangerous face’ by wearing a unique mask as we trapped, banded and released 7 –15 birds at five study sites near Seattle, WA, USA. An immediate scolding response to the dangerous mask after trapping by previously captured crows demonstrates individual learning, while an immediate response by crows that were not captured probably represents conditioning to the trapping scene by the mob of birds that assembled during the capture. Later recognition of dangerous masks by lone crows that were never captured is consistent with horizontal social learning. Independent scolding by young crows, whose parents had conditioned them to scold the dangerous mask, demonstrates vertical social learning.
Now when they see something weird (recently, a bird of prey in street light they saw through the window) they sound the alarm and the dogs go absolutely crazy.
Tangent to your tangent, but this is one reason why a guard llama works so well together with guard dogs for protecting livestock.
A llama is much more alert to potential danger than, say, sheep. Which actually is an understatement: sheep have the added problem of not making any noises when attacked or eaten by predators, and therefore not alerting guard dogs.
Dogs can teach themselves to interpret the llama's body language and pro-actively chase away coyotes or foxes or whatever it is that the llama spotted.
I've seen this in action on a family friend's sheep farm.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guard_llama
https://youtu.be/RuOVY4r9ipg
It goes also the other way around. I do not leave a note to my neighborhood crows when I move town.
I think that it has nothing to do in which terms it happens but the communication barrier. It is very possible that the crows signal that they are leaving for good but we are just missing the message. And my reason to not leave them a note is because they cant read, if they could I would.
Friends? It's probably transactional from the crow's POV, but OTOH they hang out on the fence and just sit sometimes even if there are peanuts on the ground. I enjoy seeing them, though. I will say, though, that after many pounds of peanuts not a single one of the little bastards has ever brought me a present, as is advertised. :-)
It possibly helps that I have a dog that will not tolerate a cat on the property and seems to believe that birds don't exist.
I’m always curious about animals’ perception of us. I think they don’t really have the concepts of things like doors, lids, etc, as constructed devices that are made to be manipulated. I wonder if they think we’re very clever at getting into things. And does the dog worry every day that we won’t find food?
Looking at a city on Google Maps with satellite mode on was already a revealing experience when it came out.
Now imagine a live view of that with everything moving, as part of your regular environment.
I wonder if smarter birds (such as corvids) might have developed some sort of understanding of the large-scale organization of our cities, or how road and railway networks function. Not because they somehow figured out human civilization but because they literally see those things right in front of them every day.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raccoon
[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eIl1VuGTk3g
Now they bring trinkets as gifts and leave them near the tree. We also had a crow in the past that would make barking noises when it saw our dogs and freak them out. I'm convinced it was messing with them.
I don't want to go out of my way to befriend them, because they may harass people who are not me on the property.
Now, in Seattle, we just have a nice family of three crows that hang out on our balcony on a daily basis. I much prefer this arrangement.
Gatherings are very noisy affairs, and that amplifies the numbers.
I also tell my young daughter to always be nice to them, because they will pass information not only among themselves but also down generations.
(Where I live there are no crows, please excuse my ignorance. Only common pigeons, as filthy as they are dumb, and they don't seem to hold a grudge, or think much of humans... or at all).
From the article: "One study found that, between 1941 and 2004, there were just 207 reports of pathogens transmitted from pigeons to humans – anywhere in the world. In all, there were 13 recorded deaths. The true number may be higher, but it would have to be off by several orders of magnitude to compete with the scale of infections from other domesticated animals – particularly some of those with more favourable reputations."
I like the kind of wild pigeons you can see outside cities. I reserve my contempt for city pigeons, which I like to call "flying rats".
I also like crows, but there aren't any (that I can see) where I live. I've seen them in other locations, of course.
A local sod farmer told me they shoot one and leave it dead in the field. All the other crows show up for a crow funeral and when they leave they dont come back. They remember the crow that died there and treat the area as dangerous.
Ive seen it so many times on lawns "Oh no the moles are killing my yard, what do I do?" "Buy grub control" "I bought mole pesticide and traps instead because I don't care about grubs, what are these giant dead spots in my yard now?" "Grubs, because you killed the only thing suppressing the grubs."
If you're in the PNW, those invasive grubs were going to destroy your lawn anyway.
More information: https://invasivespecies.wa.gov/priorityspecies/european-chaf...
Some trees put out a chemical barrier to growth, as well. Red Cedar and Black Walnut do it around here.
It solved the problem.
So you can let the crows have your grubs, or the grubs your grass.
They love chicken strips which feels wrong. But they like what they like.
They may become the primary intelligent species of the planet some day - since the evil LLM will never be able to predict their communications and will not be able to wipe them out
And, from my experience, don't atteack random people but those that got to close to their nest. Whatever their definition of close is.
We only have a couple of species of crow and if you're on the east coast then you're pretty much guaranteed to be seeing ravens. The crows are in the centre and the west coast, in the dry parts.
Another thing I saw at a park: The crows surrounded a swan. One would pick at the swan's butt. When the swan turned around, another would do it. It looked like they bullied the swan for entertainment.
That's not so bad! That alone makes them better than pigeons, which simply poop on everything (sidewalks, cars, people, other pigeons) regardless of any personal animosity or lack thereof.
On the subject of cruelty in animals:
> '[...] humanity may come to terms with the dwarf, the troll and even the orc, terrifying though all these may have proved to be at times, and you know why this is, Drumknott?'
> The secretary carefully folded the duster he had been using and looked at the ceiling. 'I would venture to suggest, my lord, that in their violence we recognize ourselves?'
> 'Oh, well done, Drumknott, I shall make a cynic of you yet! Predators respect other predators, do they not? They may perhaps even respect the prey: the lion may lie down with the lamb, even if only the lion is likely to get up again, but the lion will not lie down with the rat. [...]'
-- Snuff by Terry Pratchet