Friday, November the 5th, 2004
back to: title, date or indexes
Despite having tiny pea-sized brains, birds may be more intelligent than we thought. Avian scientists have been studying crows, which are apparently able to carry out tasks involving food and twigs which would be beyond the wit of a human infant. They can also make elementary tools, like hooks, though why a crow, with its fierce lacerating talons, would need a hook is beyond me. The cleverest crow in the study, incidentally, was called Betty, which seems an unusual name for a crow. If I had a pet crow, which I do not, I would call it something like Cecilia, or Hortense, or perhaps Clytemnestra! But Betty was a New Caledonian crow, so perhaps that is pertinent.
In trying to explain why minuscule bird brains are able to wield such unexpected mental power, the scientists suggest that they may work in entirely different ways to the brains of mammals. Apprised of this, Pansy Cradledew has suggested that I could challenge Edward De Bono and Tony Buzan as a self-styled brain expert and churn out a series of books, with titles such as Think Like A Crow, Rewire Your Brain The Cormorant Way, and Storm Petrel Thought Patterns Made Easy.