A special vending machine was created to see whether crows are smart enough to use it. They are.
Research finds that crows know what they know and can ponder the content of their own minds, a manifestation of higher intelligence and analytical thought long believed the sole province of humans and a few other higher mammals.
In 1949 farmers blew up 1000 Acres of Wetlands in an attempt to kill 1000s of crows. The crows moved their Roost Prior to detonation, killing none.
Crows in urban Japan and the United States have innovated a technique to crack hard-shelled nuts by dropping them onto crosswalks and letting them be run over and cracked by cars. Then they retrieve the cracked nuts when the cars are stopped at the red light.
Eight-year-old Gabi Mann of Seattle, Washington receives gifts from crows in her garden. She feeds the crows regularly and little “treasures” are given in return including a miniature silver ball, a black button, a blue paper clip, a yellow bead, a blue Lego piece, and a pearl colored heart.
When a crow dies, the other crows investigate if there’s a threat where the death occurred, so they can avoid it in the future.
Research from Moscow State University & the University of Iowa discovered that crows exhibit strong behavioral signs of analogical reasoning—the ability to solve puzzles like “bird is to air as fish is to what?” Analogical reasoning only develops in humans between the ages of three & four.
Crows are smart as great apes and able to show: imagination, the anticipation of possible future events, to solve problems which require abstract reasoning. Problems which once were only thought possible by humans and great apes.
A group of crows got so mad at a mask wearing researcher for giving them identification bands that they recruited more crows to harass anyone wearing the same mask years after the fact.
Crows are monogamous and raise families together. Offspring from previous seasons even remain with the family to help rear new nestlings.