Anger a Crow and It Will Never Forget Your Face

Discovery News ^ | 6-28-2011 | Jennifer Viegas

[Renfield]

THE GIST

* Crows remember the faces of "dangerous humans," with the memories likely lasting for a bird's lifetime.

* Crows may scold people who threaten them, bringing in relatives and even strangers to mob the person.

* The crows within mobs then indirectly learn about the person, so they too associate that individual's face with danger and react accordingly.

Crows remember the faces of threatening humans and often react by scolding and bringing in others to mob the perceived miscreant, according to a new study published in the latest Proceedings of the Royal Society B.

Since the mob members also then indirectly learn about the threatening person, the findings demonstrate how just a single crow's bad experience with a particular human can spread information about this individual throughout entire crow communities....

[Louis Foxwell]

Ann wrote about this phenomenon in her recent book, Demonic. The mob of nasty crows, sic liberals, attack anything they perceive as conservative.

[SIDENET]

Crows have suffered tremendously from West Nile Fever. They are just now recovering. It’s actually very difficult to find a flock.

I know that they were hit hard on the East coast, but in the Pac NW, they are everywhere. I've never seen so many damn crows.

For a depiction of the crow situation in WA state, please see the pic in post #2. (only somewhat kidding) ;-)

[Pollster1]

they did this study by having people put on a mask and then the crows went after the person with the mask

So if we see someone with an excellent Obama mask (or even better, excellent makeup/latex face shape) throwing rocks at crows near the speech venues where the communist is planning on campaigning, we'll know it's a Freeper who read this thread. I wonder if the Secret Service would or even could object to that action. Even if the crows dive-bomb the real druggie and decorate him like pigeons decorate a statue, which our Dear Leader richly deserves, would training them to despise him as much as all real Americans do constitute a violation of any law? [Note: I am not advocating any non-electoral action against the evil thug who is destroying our country, just musing on a potential form of entertainment.]

[Broker]

Excellent idea.. Crows, Squirrels, all creation will then fear the ONE.

[jrushing]

spread information about this individual throughout entire crow communities...

[NavyCanDo]

Sort of the opposite thing happened to me. I walk about two blocks from the building I work at to the parking garage and often pass crows in the trees or grass field. One day I had a bag of kettle corn and I threw a handful towards to crows, who swooped down to eat their fill. For the next two weeks or so, they would all swoop down in my path hoping I would feed them again. They knew me as the guy that fed them. After two weeks or so of not getting anymore they went back to their normal crow routine.

My sister had a pet crow back in the late 1950s. The front door was open and it just walked into the house. She closed the door and was able to capture him, and kept it as a pet for some time.

[Rebelbase]

Crows have been on my list of least favorite birds since I was a kid camping in S. Florida. They’d wake you at the crack of dawn cawing and steal food from your plate/pan if you left it unattended.

[Doogle]

Crows are punctual and territorial. They do recognize people and often stop by to see what’s available...as far as what they eat, they will eat anything that don’t eat them.
Before I retired while at work I fell into the habit of feeding some local crows who’s territory I happen to park in while on lunch break (the parking lot)
Daily they(5) would show up at the same time,some would walk right up to the door of my car,while others would wait from the security of a near by branch. One day while sitting there I noticed they hadn’t shown up. I had some chicken wings that I had finished with and decided “to leave”...while going back to work, I figured if the crows didn’t get what I had left, the local critters would...
Like I said punctual and predictable,while going indoors I looked out towards the back of the parking lot and there they were, I said to myself, well better late then never, it wasn’t till about an hour later someone had mentioned Daylight Savings Time....*SMILES*....they weren’t late,I was an hour early.

[Puppage]

Crows may scold people who threaten them, bringing in relatives and even strangers to mob the person.

They have a lot in common with the DNC.

[Doogle]

..while working on a golf course, we had hawks buzzzzz us daily. They too get familiar with regulars, to the point where they wouldn’t flee as quickly if they knew you. I used to get a kick out of the younger hawks playing with a kill occasionally....throw the chipmunk in the air (bout 5 feet away)...then bounce on it.
The buzzzing would come as we used to cut new hole locations...we’d be cutting away and from no where a hawk would very silently swoop over our heads, very close, a few feet.

[Lazamataz]

A distant cousin of mine also descended from the same guy raised pheasant ~ he could get wild ducks to jump into his open arms.

No he couldn't.

I can't quite do that.

Yeah you can.

[muawiyah]

Not really laz. Go try it sometime. I can call them out of the sky but they don’t jump in my arms. It takes a real touch to do that.

[thesearethetimes...]

Fascinating information bump.

[Jonty30]

It was probably territorial. I didn’t pay much mind about it swooping onto my head, until that day when I was looking straight ahead into some claws. :)

Then I started walking the long way around the field.

[Lazamataz]

Not really laz. Go try it sometime. I can call them out of the sky but they don’t jump in my arms. It takes a real touch to do that.

Indeed.

[dblshot]

Kinda explains the bird brains over at Moveon.org.

[thesearethetimes...]

Were they all peregrines? I thought I saw a few Red Tailed Hawks in there.

Raptors are simply stunningly beautiful animals; absolutely perfect in form and function; but to borrow from Jeff Goldbloom in “The Fly” - “Have you ever heard of insect politics? Neither have I. Insects... don’t have politics. They’re very... brutal. No compassion, no compromise.”

May God give us strength and wisdom.
Tatt

[Diamond]

Every now and then you can actually capture one of them and teach it to talk ~ not as good as a parrot but enough to understand what they're trying to say.

I use that method with court clerks. It also works with some Democrats.

Cordially,

[Doogle]

...occasionally while watching golfers hit it right down the middle, a hawk would fly in a sit there over the ball, it seem like a challenge, it would be a stand off, golfers approach, stand there looking at hawk, hawk looking back, then he would fly off.....it might be another foursome coming along an hour later, same routine..*grins*

[Daffynition]

Crow hunting is fascinating. Quite a bird.

Decoying and Calling Crows