The Amaz’n Raven
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We recently encountered an interesting signboard that talked about ravens and how they figure prominently in much of Native American and First Nation lore. Sometimes it is portrayed as the creator, or has a big role in the creation legend, such as in one story, how it brought the sun, moon, stars, fresh water and fire to the world. It is often also seen as the trickster, symbolizing magic, creativity and mischief. The raven is a big part of many other legends as well. In Greek mythology, the raven was the messenger of Apollo, and was white. When his raven delivered the message that Coronis, his lover, had been unfaithful, Apollo, in his anger, burned the raven, forever turning it black.
In Norse legend, ravens were the eyes and ears of Odin, flying out each day to gather all the news, while in Welsh mythology, the raven is a omen of impending death, and if it made a choking sound, it was a portent of a death rattle in someone close.
Depiction of Odin with his Ravens
In England, at least six pairs of ravens are always kept at the Tower of London. Legend has it that if all the ravens ever leave the tower, the British monarchy will fall, thus their guardian, the Ravenmaster, keeps them well fed, and as an added precaution, clips their wings.
Ravenmaster Barney Chandler with a raven at the Tower of London
To most of us, however, it’s Poe’s poem The Raven, that comes to mind, which conjures dark thoughts of madness resulting from a lost love: “Quoth the Raven “Nevermore””.
Quoth the Raven “Nevermore”
When we’ve encountered ravens, they’ve seemed inquisitive and a bit raucous. I wasn’t surprised to learn they are perhaps the smartest of the birds - which, I thought, was a really low bar. I was astounded to discover, however, that they may actually have an intelligence on a par with dolphins and chimpanzees.
A lot of research has been done on both the raven and its near cousin, the crow. Here are some amazing facts about both:
They not only use tools… they make them.
It’s well-documented that crows and ravens use tools to get food. They’ve been observed using a stick to impale two pieces of food so that they can carry both at the same time, rather than leave one morsel behind. They’ve been known to pull an ice fisherman’s line up from the water and swipe the caught fish. They can also make tools, though. In the wild, crows have been observed breaking off a small branch, peeling the bark off, then fashioning a hook on the end in order to pry food out of a small space.
They are masterful mimics.
Ravens have at least 7 different calls and can imitate the calls of other birds, like geese, jays, and crows. They have been trained to count aloud up to seven, and some have learned more than 100 words, up to 50 complete sentences and even a few songs; others have been known to mimic their owners' voices in order to call dogs and taunt horses.
In the wild, they have been observed mimicking wolves in order to draw them to dead or dying prey. The wolves would then tear open the animal, and once they had eaten their fill, the ravens would begin their own feast.
They remember human faces… and grievances.
If you are a researcher studying crows and ravens, you may want to wear a mask, especially if you are doing something that will annoy them. These birds not only differentiate between human faces, but have a long memory as one researcher learned after capturing and tagging several crows. After that affront to their pride, he was loudly scolded by the birds every time he approached. Even worse, when he returned three years later, he found that the birds had told others crows about his bad behavior, as even more of them scolded him.
In another experiment, a raven was taught to trade a low quality bit of food, in this case a piece of bread, with a human in exchange for a better treat - cheese. One man came in several times and traded a piece of cheese with the the bird. Then another man came in with a piece of cheese, but after the man took the bread, he ate the cheese instead of giving it to the bird. Three weeks later, three men came into the enclosure, the nice man, the cheating man and a neutral man the raven had not seen before, each with a piece of cheese. The raven avoided the cheating man, preferring to trade with the nice man.
They are amazing problem solvers.
Two experiments show how really smart these guys are. In the first one, a piece of food is dropped onto a small beaker of water. Although the food floats, the beaker is too small for the bird to get his beak close enough to the food to nab it. On the table near the beaker are several small stones. After pondering the problem for a few moments, the bird began dropping the stones into the water, making the level rise. After each stone, the bird eyed the beaker to see whether the food is close enough to grab. After the fourth or fifth stone, the bird was able to snag the food.
The video here shows the experiment much better than my description.
The next experiment absolutely astounded me. A very tasty morsel of food is placed inside an enclosure, well out of reach of the bird. In order to get it, he must find a stick to reach it. Sure enough, there’s a stick attached to a string hanging from the ceiling, which he quickly gets, but, bummer, it’s too short. What else is there? There are three stones, each inside enclosures and a longer stick inside a fourth. You have to watch this video to see how he figures out that he has to use the short stick to obtain the three stones and then use them to get the longer stick. In my mind, they are the engineers of the bird world, but without the nerd gene.
https://youtu.be/AVaITA7eBZE
They mourn their dead.
When a crow dies, other crows gather around, noisily chatting with each other. This can sometimes last for hours or even for days. It may be that they’re mourning the loss of a friend, or it may be that they’re attempting to figure out why their friend bird died, so as to avoid danger.
Ravens shun selfish peers.
In a 2015 study, ravens were given a task requiring two of them to work together in order to obtain the reward. They both had to pull on lines that raised a platform which had two pieces of cheese, one for each of them. If one of the ravens then ate both pieces of cheese, the other raven would, in the future, refuse to cooperate with the offending raven, but had no problem cooperating with other ravens who shared. This sophisticated method of keeping a partner in check was previously only seen in humans and apes, according to the lead researcher.
They are playful.
Ravens seem to enjoy aerobics like barrel-rolls, somersaults and even flying upside down, especially to attract mates. Once they find a mate, they often fly wingtip to wingtip with their partner. Young ones have been seen playing catch by picking up a stick, flying high, then dropping it, and racing other ravens to be the first to nab it before it hits the ground.
Lest you think that only ravens and crows are smart, however, cormorants are no slouches either. In Asia, cormorants are used by fishermen to help catch fish. A string is tied around the bird’s neck to prevent it from swallowing the fish it catches, then the bird is released into the water, attached to the boat with a long tether. When it catches a fish, the cormorant is pulled back into the boat and forced to release its catch. In some places, like the Li River in China, the fisherman lets the bird have every eighth fish it catches. The cormorants can evidently count that high, because if the fisherman doesn’t give him the eighth fish, the bird will refuse to leave its perch and won’t continue hunting until it is fed.
Chinese Fisherman with His Cormorant Photo Lisa Kristine
See you next week…