Crows

[kamalktk]

Humans: Anti-bird spikes!
Crows: lol, how cute, nesting material!

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smar...ti-bird-spikes-to-build-their-nests-180982546

Birds in Europe are prying up the metal barbs, meant to repel them from roosting on buildings, and using the devices as nesting material

These clever corvids have commandeered anti-bird spikes—the long strips of needle-like rods used to repel birds from roosting on rooftops, doorframes or other human-made structures—and begun using them as nesting material, according to a new paper published this week in the National History Museum Rotterdam’s journal Deinsea.

 

[maximus otter]

Crows Hold “Funerals” For Their Dead, But The Service Can Get Weird

Crows have a peculiar response to death. Folklore states they hold court to decide an individual bird’s capital fate, likely spurred on by observations of groups of crows – that come with the goth collective noun of “a murder of crows” – standing around a dead bird. This does happen but not in the way people used to think. The weird truth is, crows hold their own kinds of “funerals” when a group member dies.

The purpose of their “funerals” is more investigative than your typical human death party, however, as it’s thought observing the dead can enable them to establish if there’s a lingering threat they need to know about.

When a crow finds another dead crow, they’ll often make alarm calls or a series of loud scolds (a kind of vocalization) to bring the death to the attention of other crows. These alarm calls trigger mobbing, a behavior that sees the crows gather around the carcass and scold, and this can go on for 15 to 20 minutes.

During this time, their big brains are whirring away trying to work out what happened so they can avoid the same fate. Sometimes things do get a bit weird, mind. Necrophilia isn't a classic segment of funerals.

One of the weirder methodologies we’ve come across was an awesome study that put crows’ fear of death and danger to the test by getting human participants to don masks and wander around wielding taxidermy birds that would look dead to local crows.

Getting the masked-up “bird murderers” to stand near feeding stations revealed crows would scold when they saw them, with the behavior being most pronounced when the human was accompanied by a dead crow and a hawk – a common predator of crows. They were less fussed when the humans were carrying dead pigeons.

When specific masks were associated with holding dead crows, even if they were face-swapped onto different bodies, the birds built an association between that face and crow death. The study, which took place across more than 100 sites in Washington State, revealed a crow would consider that face a threat for up to six weeks, even if it later walked out not holding a dead crow in its hands.

https://www.iflscience.com/crows-hold-funerals-for-their-dead-but-the-service-can-get-weird-70596

maximus otter

 

[Sid]

Crows Hold “Funerals” For Their Dead, But The Service Can Get Weird

Crows have a peculiar response to death. Folklore states they hold court to decide an individual bird’s capital fate, likely spurred on by observations of groups of crows – that come with the goth collective noun of “a murder of crows” – standing around a dead bird. This does happen but not in the way people used to think. The weird truth is, crows hold their own kinds of “funerals” when a group member dies.

The purpose of their “funerals” is more investigative than your typical human death party, however, as it’s thought observing the dead can enable them to establish if there’s a lingering threat they need to know about.

When a crow finds another dead crow, they’ll often make alarm calls or a series of loud scolds (a kind of vocalization) to bring the death to the attention of other crows. These alarm calls trigger mobbing, a behavior that sees the crows gather around the carcass and scold, and this can go on for 15 to 20 minutes.

During this time, their big brains are whirring away trying to work out what happened so they can avoid the same fate. Sometimes things do get a bit weird, mind. Necrophilia isn't a classic segment of funerals.

One of the weirder methodologies we’ve come across was an awesome study that put crows’ fear of death and danger to the test by getting human participants to don masks and wander around wielding taxidermy birds that would look dead to local crows.

Getting the masked-up “bird murderers” to stand near feeding stations revealed crows would scold when they saw them, with the behavior being most pronounced when the human was accompanied by a dead crow and a hawk – a common predator of crows. They were less fussed when the humans were carrying dead pigeons.

When specific masks were associated with holding dead crows, even if they were face-swapped onto different bodies, the birds built an association between that face and crow death. The study, which took place across more than 100 sites in Washington State, revealed a crow would consider that face a threat for up to six weeks, even if it later walked out not holding a dead crow in its hands.

https://www.iflscience.com/crows-hold-funerals-for-their-dead-but-the-service-can-get-weird-70596

maximus otter

I witnessed this Crow-collective assembly only last week - when it seemed that a cat had caught one across the road from where I live, and within seconds a mob of other Crows suddenly appeared from around the area along with a lot of noise, then it fell quiet (normal sounds) again.
P.S. Large Seagulls (Black-backs or the extra large Herring Gulls) hound the Crows nesting sites most mornings, and up goes their repeated ruckus, even though it's definitively an inland sight.

 

[escargot]

Birds in Europe are prying up the metal barbs, meant to repel them from roosting on buildings, and using the devices as nesting material

That's WELL 'ard.

 

[Who me]

I used to feed the birds regularly in my back garden including crows and jackdaws.
And had a large rook die in it. I didn’t know this straight away as it was winter and it had sheltered in the shrubbery.
The thing is its partner/mate stayed with it the whole time before I found it i could get to within a few feet of it and feed it it left when I discovered the dead one and disposed of it

 

[maximus otter]

Russian (?) crows playing in the snow on parked cars:

maximus otter