Dr. Sooz wrote: >> Y'all need to see what this crow does: >>
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> What does he do? It takes forever to download on my ancient > computer.....
This was on CNN about a week ago.
There's food in a little basket at the bottom of a tube. The crow has figured out (apparently all on his own) that if you take a piece of wire and bend it, you can use it as a hook to lift the basket out of the tube and get the food. The crow did this over and over, once he made his first tool.
People and apes are not the only creatures to make and use tools. There are some finches on the Galapagos Islands who use thorns to spear termites and extract them from the termite mound, but this crow is the first to be photographed actually creating a tool from something not found in nature (i.e., the piece of wire).
CNN also had a segement on an African Pied Crow who was trained to pick up bits of litter, like a soda can, and stow them in a recycling container.
Arondelle