When most people think of March, a big holiday that sticks out is the famous St. Patrick’s Day. What isn’t there to love about the holiday? Not only do you get to be a nuisance to your friends who choose not to wear green or who were born with red hair, but I also found enjoyment in hearing stories about Leprechauns and their pots of gold, which I would always dream about going out and finding.
With this in mind, when I was thinking about which animal to choose for “March Animal of the Month,” I couldn’t ignore the bird that is largely considered a nuisance AND has a record of stealing shiny objects. The American Crow (Otherwise known as Corvus brachyrhynchos for you nerds out there) can be found all over the United States and Canada and can be identified by their famous “CAW CAW” call.
The American Crow is the truest scavenger as they will eat anything and I mean ANYTHING they can get in their beaks (including but not limited to Fruit, Seeds, Insects, Trash, Roadkill and the French Fries my mom bought me when I was six that I may or may not still be salty about to this day).
However, because of their scavenging prowess, American Crows are considered nuisances and are often treated as such by both farmers and regular people alike (if you’ve ever had to clean up trash after a crow got in it, you would understand).
In my opinion, the most interesting thing about American Crows is their scary levels of intelligence; their brain to body sizes are HUGE, as they are considered to have intelligence on par with that of Primates.
Lastly, I would like to touch on one of their most famous behaviors: thievery. Crows have been observed stealing random shiny objects, food, and in some cases, even money. Some people have trained Crows to bring them these objects in exchange for food. So if you’re bored and interested in helping enable avian thievery or happen to have an excess of food, why don’t you give it a try!
If you have free time and want to read a very interesting study about the intelligence of American crows, I will be linking a summary of a study that was done on them at the bottom of the article, but in the meantime just be nice to crows (Because they will remember you and I am not kidding, read the study).
That’s all for this month’s Animal of the Month. If you are interested in having a certain animal highlighted, please email us at [email protected] with your suggestions, and you will receive a shout-out if we decide to go with your animal. Until our next walk through Animal Kingdom, stay curious.
Study:
“Crows Can Distinguish Faces In a Crowd”
Garry Hamilton
https://www.nwf.org/Magazines/
