7 ms·

Have posted this before, but it really left an impression about crows, and the bond between their mates: Years ago I was putting out the garbage in the back al

by tux1968 2y ago

Have posted this before, but it really left an impression about crows, and the bond between their mates: Years ago I was putting out the garbage in the back alley behind our building where I lived on the 8th floor. A crow attacked me out of the blue. Distracted by the attack, the back door slammed shut behind me. Since my key was only good for the front door, I had to walk around the building. That damn crow followed me the entire time, dive bombing my head, and screaming bloody murder at me. It was a little spooky. When I finally got back inside and upstairs, I went and looked out the living room window, which looked out the same direction as the back alley. The crow had flown back around and was at the 8th floor looking in the window, from the other side of the pigeon netting we had on our balcony. On the inside of the pigeon netting, was another crow, desperately trying to figure out how it could escape. Not really sure how it had got itself through the pigeon netting in the first place. I went out and sliced a hole through the netting and the trapped crow quickly joined its mate outside, who finally stopped screaming bloody murder. To this day it still amazes me that the crow's mate, knew which apartment I lived in and spotted me downstairs.

jiggawatts 2y ago
Corvids can recognise faces and they are territorial and know the humans in their territory.
- nullhole 2y ago
  A cheeky experiment was done to prove this back in the aughts: https://www.science.org/content/article/caveman-or-dick-cheney-crows-know-difference https://www.science.org/content/article/caveman-or-dick-chen... "In a creative experiment that relied on rubber masks of former Vice President Dick Cheney and other distinctive mugs, researchers have shown that American crows have an uncanny ability to pick a familiar human face out of a crowd."
  - 000ooo000 2y ago
    I vaguely remember a doco (about a study?) where they established similar fear in crows using similar masks. They tracked these crows, waited for them to breed, and tested how the babies responded. Saw this over a decade ago now I'd guess, so my memory is fuzzy, but IIRC the takeaway was that the parent crows were able to communicate the knowledge to their offspring that these masks were bad news.
    - eru 2y ago
      I remember that story from the documentary called 'A Murder of Crows'.
  - Modified3019 2y ago
    Study in question: https://sci-hub.st/http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.anbehav.2009.12.022 https://sci-hub.st/http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.anbehav.2009....
- cduzz 2y ago
  A friend used to jog around the university I worked at; he'd jog past an area that, for a month out of the year, was under a hawk nest. He came by commenting that he'd been dive-bombed by a hawk that was obviously guarding it's nest he said it had bonked him on the head and yelled at him -- he decided not to go jogging that way for a while after. I was kinda impressed that the hawk had "bonk human on head" mode as well as "use lethal claws to kill things and eat them later" mode -- seemed like an interesting level of restraint to bonk but not cut the human. That the crow had a mental map of the building sufficiently detailed to know "human on 8th floor may be able to help Charles get out out of net in front of human's cliff cave if I yell at him" seems several orders of magnitude more complex...
  - mikestew 2y ago
    I've had owls do the same thing, and thankfully without talons in full attack mode. "Aggressive owls" weren't a thing I recall growing up in the Midwest, but they're sure in the Pacific Northwest.
    - aaronbrethorst 2y ago
      https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/angry-owl-warning-signs-become-reality-398472259641 https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/angry-owl-warning-...
- selcuka 2y ago
  > Corvids can recognise faces They can also "share that knowledge of dangerous humans with other crows". [1] [1] https://www.discovermagazine.com/planet-earth/grudge-holding-crows-pass-on-their-anger-to-family-and-friends https://www.discovermagazine.com/planet-earth/grudge-holding...
  - roughly 2y ago
    I always chuckle at this study - "Ah shit, they've got the masks on again."
- 14 2y ago
  My dad always told a story about a guy at work who spotted a crow nest not too far up a tree and decided he would steal the baby crow and raise it. The crows attacked him as he did it and in the end the baby crow died in his care. Sad. But at least after that my dad said every single day he would pull up to work and if any crows were there they would dive bomb him. Only him. My dad said this carried on for years.
  - usrusr 2y ago
    Assuming that the crows attacking years later were not conveyed a detailed account of the original events, this is an interesting model also applies to many human group behaviors: "this is the guy we hate, it gives a great feeling of community expressing that hate. Yeah, there's probably a reason why we hate him, but that's besides the point"
- ycombinete 2y ago
  During Covid crows started harassing a lot of people in our area while walking around. I realised it was because they didn’t like someone who wore a blue mask. If I took my mast off or wore a different style of mask they’d leave me alone, and bother other people who looked similar to me with a blue mask on.
  - YurgenJurgensen 2y ago
    I used to joke about all the venues which suddenly announced themselves as ‘corvid secure’ in 2020, but maybe this was what they were talking about.
natmaka 2y ago
We should establish that the crow would only 'attack' any human living in this flat (and neglect any other human walking by this back alley).
- nirav72 2y ago
  I’m surprised no one has attempted to train crows for use in asymmetrical warfare. At least before the advent of cheap drones.
  - beezlewax 2y ago
    This is a bit in a Chris Morris movie called Four Lions.
    - d1sxeyes 2y ago
      Barry says we come out blurry
  - kibae 2y ago
    Pigeons were used in WW1 and WW2 for communication. Paddy the pigeon [0] flew 230 miles across the English channel to relay the success of the D-Day invasion. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paddy_(pigeon) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paddy_(pigeon)
    - conception 2y ago
      And “almost” as guide systems for bombs! https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Pigeon https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Pigeon
    - nirav72 2y ago
      I've known about pigeons being used for communications and even bottle-nose dolphins being used for clearing mines in WW2. But I'm just curious if they've ever attempted to use crows for reconnaissance or early warning systems. Especially for use at something like forward operating bases that are always prone to enemy ambushes. Or maybe even using crows to alert of enemy movements. I watched a video earlier today on a YT channel I follow called Curious Droid. This episode went into how the U.S military had a hard time determining vietcong troop movements due to the thick jungle foilege. So DARPA developed this concept of electronic fenses, where the airforce would drop these sensor packages into the jungle. The package would have sesmic sensors and microphones to capture movement of enemy forces through the jungle. The problem was that this being the 1960s/70s - the batteries only lasted couple of weeks. Also data storage and tranmission rates weren't advance enough at the time to send that information to a centralize location far from the contested area. So they had to have an aircraft loitering above to collect this data and then fly the collected data to a processing facility in Thailand. By the time the data was classified and analyized, the intelligence collected wasn't really actionable for the commanders in the field. Here is the video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=feDk6oaeVAY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=feDk6oaeVAY
m463 2y ago
But did you get crow credit for the save??
- theginger 2y ago
  I wonder if the crow thought it had bullied you into releasing the crow you had captured or convinced you to rescue one that had trapped itself.
running101 2y ago
Maybe it was because you were A human, not the fact it was specifically you.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]

jiggawatts 2y ago

Corvids can recognise faces and they are territorial and know the humans in their territory.

nullhole 2y ago
A cheeky experiment was done to prove this back in the aughts: https://www.science.org/content/article/caveman-or-dick-cheney-crows-know-difference https://www.science.org/content/article/caveman-or-dick-chen... "In a creative experiment that relied on rubber masks of former Vice President Dick Cheney and other distinctive mugs, researchers have shown that American crows have an uncanny ability to pick a familiar human face out of a crowd."
- 000ooo000 2y ago
  I vaguely remember a doco (about a study?) where they established similar fear in crows using similar masks. They tracked these crows, waited for them to breed, and tested how the babies responded. Saw this over a decade ago now I'd guess, so my memory is fuzzy, but IIRC the takeaway was that the parent crows were able to communicate the knowledge to their offspring that these masks were bad news.
  - eru 2y ago
    I remember that story from the documentary called 'A Murder of Crows'.
- Modified3019 2y ago
  Study in question: https://sci-hub.st/http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.anbehav.2009.12.022 https://sci-hub.st/http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.anbehav.2009....
cduzz 2y ago
A friend used to jog around the university I worked at; he'd jog past an area that, for a month out of the year, was under a hawk nest. He came by commenting that he'd been dive-bombed by a hawk that was obviously guarding it's nest he said it had bonked him on the head and yelled at him -- he decided not to go jogging that way for a while after. I was kinda impressed that the hawk had "bonk human on head" mode as well as "use lethal claws to kill things and eat them later" mode -- seemed like an interesting level of restraint to bonk but not cut the human. That the crow had a mental map of the building sufficiently detailed to know "human on 8th floor may be able to help Charles get out out of net in front of human's cliff cave if I yell at him" seems several orders of magnitude more complex...
- mikestew 2y ago
  I've had owls do the same thing, and thankfully without talons in full attack mode. "Aggressive owls" weren't a thing I recall growing up in the Midwest, but they're sure in the Pacific Northwest.
  - aaronbrethorst 2y ago
    https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/angry-owl-warning-signs-become-reality-398472259641 https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/angry-owl-warning-...
selcuka 2y ago
> Corvids can recognise faces They can also "share that knowledge of dangerous humans with other crows". [1] [1] https://www.discovermagazine.com/planet-earth/grudge-holding-crows-pass-on-their-anger-to-family-and-friends https://www.discovermagazine.com/planet-earth/grudge-holding...
- roughly 2y ago
  I always chuckle at this study - "Ah shit, they've got the masks on again."
14 2y ago
My dad always told a story about a guy at work who spotted a crow nest not too far up a tree and decided he would steal the baby crow and raise it. The crows attacked him as he did it and in the end the baby crow died in his care. Sad. But at least after that my dad said every single day he would pull up to work and if any crows were there they would dive bomb him. Only him. My dad said this carried on for years.
- usrusr 2y ago
  Assuming that the crows attacking years later were not conveyed a detailed account of the original events, this is an interesting model also applies to many human group behaviors: "this is the guy we hate, it gives a great feeling of community expressing that hate. Yeah, there's probably a reason why we hate him, but that's besides the point"
ycombinete 2y ago
During Covid crows started harassing a lot of people in our area while walking around. I realised it was because they didn’t like someone who wore a blue mask. If I took my mast off or wore a different style of mask they’d leave me alone, and bother other people who looked similar to me with a blue mask on.
- YurgenJurgensen 2y ago
  I used to joke about all the venues which suddenly announced themselves as ‘corvid secure’ in 2020, but maybe this was what they were talking about.

natmaka 2y ago

We should establish that the crow would only 'attack' any human living in this flat (and neglect any other human walking by this back alley).

nirav72 2y ago
I’m surprised no one has attempted to train crows for use in asymmetrical warfare. At least before the advent of cheap drones.
- beezlewax 2y ago
  This is a bit in a Chris Morris movie called Four Lions.
  - d1sxeyes 2y ago
    Barry says we come out blurry
- kibae 2y ago
  Pigeons were used in WW1 and WW2 for communication. Paddy the pigeon [0] flew 230 miles across the English channel to relay the success of the D-Day invasion. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paddy_(pigeon) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paddy_(pigeon)
  - conception 2y ago
    And “almost” as guide systems for bombs! https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Pigeon https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Pigeon
  - nirav72 2y ago
    I've known about pigeons being used for communications and even bottle-nose dolphins being used for clearing mines in WW2. But I'm just curious if they've ever attempted to use crows for reconnaissance or early warning systems. Especially for use at something like forward operating bases that are always prone to enemy ambushes. Or maybe even using crows to alert of enemy movements. I watched a video earlier today on a YT channel I follow called Curious Droid. This episode went into how the U.S military had a hard time determining vietcong troop movements due to the thick jungle foilege. So DARPA developed this concept of electronic fenses, where the airforce would drop these sensor packages into the jungle. The package would have sesmic sensors and microphones to capture movement of enemy forces through the jungle. The problem was that this being the 1960s/70s - the batteries only lasted couple of weeks. Also data storage and tranmission rates weren't advance enough at the time to send that information to a centralize location far from the contested area. So they had to have an aircraft loitering above to collect this data and then fly the collected data to a processing facility in Thailand. By the time the data was classified and analyized, the intelligence collected wasn't really actionable for the commanders in the field. Here is the video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=feDk6oaeVAY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=feDk6oaeVAY

m463 2y ago

But did you get crow credit for the save??

theginger 2y ago
I wonder if the crow thought it had bullied you into releasing the crow you had captured or convinced you to rescue one that had trapped itself.

running101 2y ago

Maybe it was because you were A human, not the fact it was specifically you.

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]