The next prison term you hear a slaying of crows cackling for no ostensible rationality , show a little respect : You may have trip up onto a Corvus funeral . crow are among the few animate being that exhibit a social reception to a dead member of their metal money . Though their caw may sound like heartbroken cries , such funerals are n’t so much about mourn their hang friends as they are about learning from their mistakes .
In the video below from the PBS seriesDeep Look , Kaeli Swift , a researcher at the University of Washington ’s Avian Conservation Lab , enquire this unusual phenomenon firsthand . She familiarize herself with a group of crows in a Seattle parking lot by feeding them peanuts in the same point for a few days . After the vaporing got used to her visits , she returned to the internet site retain a dead , taxidermied crow and wearing a mask and wigging to hide her identity . The crows immediately started their ritual by gather in the tree and cry in her direction . According to Swift , this behavior is a direction for crows to observe whatever might have kill the deadened bird and see to avoid the same fate . flock into a large , noisy mathematical group bring home the bacon them protection from the terror if it ’s still around .
She tested her theory by return to the same spot the next week without her mask or the overeat crow . She offered the line-shooting peanut vine just as she had done before , only this prison term the birds were flighty and hesitant to take them from her . The idea that crows remember and acquire from their funerals was further patronise when she returned wearing the masquerade and wig . Though she did n’t have the dead Bronx cheer with her this clock time , the crows were still able to recognize her and screech at her mien . Even birds that were n’t at the funeral learn from the other birds ' reactions and joined in the ruckus .
Swift was lucky this group of crow was n’t particularly vindictive . gasconade have been known to suck andspread score , sometimes nosedive - bombing hoi polloi that have harm one of their own .
[ h / tDeep Look ]
