Lillie said:
Nice to see another corvid fan here.
I'm a big fan of the little black feathery chaps.
My objection to the crow deck is 'not enough crows!'
Cute, though, arn't they!
Yes, I love watching them because of how intelligent they are. They play tricks and hatch devious schemes all the time around people who don't notice that there's another intelligent species in their midst. I once watched a crow hop up to a garbage bag, peck at it a few times, then hop back and look left and right, and repeat the process until it had gotten the fries it wanted from inside the bag and flown off with them. It was as if it was trying to be as covert as possible. They're also known to play games, such as sliding down snowy hills on their backs, then hopping back up to the top, and doing it over and over again. They can also
make tools, an ability that was previously thought to belong only to us, dolphins, and other primates.
I'm also fascinated with parrots. They're very intelligent too. For example,
Alex, the African grey parrot who not only can say words, but has learned what some of the expressions he uses mean. He understands concepts of color, number (even the number
zero), and shape, and even some of the nuances of human interaction, such as
knowing when to say "I'm sorry." The third clip down on
this page features some wonderful footage of Alex.
There's more links to articles about smart corvids and parrots in
this old Livejournal entry of mine. I find them to be such fascinating animals!
