Ozbow

8th Nov 2014, I noticed this young fella was unable to lift off the ground, so I thought I would mind him until he could, this is the second time I have had the PLEASURE to be involved with a "rescue" crow, the last time in 2005.

Five days later I let him out...to date he still gets into his cage every evening, out every morning, feeds himself to a degree but comes calling several times a day for a little extra tucker, some company and a bath in the dogs water container.

When he matures (not too soon I hope) and finds a murder and mate he will leave to do what he was meant to do, when that time comes I will miss him as he has become a very close mate, as friendly/lovable, and no different to any of the so called aviary birds (only smarter IMHO)

They are a nice looking bird the Australian Bush Raven, ie the crow. Extremely intelligent too. Sometimes too intelligent. I once saw one take a steak off a barbecue and drop it into a small pool of water on the ground for a couple of seconds to cool it down. It then picked it up again and flew off. I thought it was amazing. The bloke who lost his steak thought it was a thief.

I really like crows. We have a resident family who move in each spring to raise their young. They're very intelligent birds. I've seen them try to eat my dog's dry food, but it's too large for them to get it down. They drop the pieces into the dog's water bowl and they then stand there and watch it until it starts to sink and then they quickly grab it and because it's now nice and soft, they can eat it easily. They do this time and again. I've often seen them hiding excess food like a dog does and they remember exactly where they put it, days later.

When we have some left overs that the dog can't have, I take it outside and sit it on a stump. I then give my crow call a few blows and they're all there within a minute or so.

A few years back, one of the young crows got hit by a car out on the road in front of our place and its wing was broken. I tried very hard to keep it alive, by feeding it regularly and making sure it had water, but it must have had other injuries and it ended up dying. Maybe it died from an infection or something.

We have resident magpies too, but they don't get on well with the crows at all.

Good story Axe.

Myself, I can't say one good thing about crows.

Jeff

As you say highly intelligent! Saw a show once on idiot box where crows were picking up hard shelled nuts and placing them on nearby pedestrian crossing so cars would run over them and crack the shells. that isn't the kicker though, they were waiting until the traffic lights were green for pedestrians before waltzing over and grabbing their booty. UNREAL.

I have to admit, I love these animals.
They are extra my Inteligent, and i Love the call they make, it makes me chuckle as they sound so morbid and fed up haha

Stickbow Hunter wrote:Good story Axe.

Myself, I can't say one good thing about crows.

Jeff

They can be fun to watch to see what they get up to, but they've also been a bit destructive around my place (pecking their way into things to see if they're good to eat, and destroying them in the process), so I'm a bit on the fence about them.

But cheer up Jeff - apparently the Torresian Crow (an Australian native species very similiar looking to the Australian Raven) has figured out how kill Cane Toads and eat them by flipping them over (to avoid the poison glands) and going in through the throat and underbelly instead.

I'd also heard that government scientists had located populations of these crows with this behaviour and were trapping and moving individuals from these populations to other regions so that the crows in those areas could learn the same behaviour from observing the introduced individuals, i.e. building a native Australian Anti-Cane-Toad Air Force and hopefully reigning in the spread of the little blighters.

Keep an eye out for them Jeff - the map of their distribution on Wiki indicates they're in you area (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torresian_Crow).

Here's a thought - instead of having to use actual crows to spread the behaviour, how about (next to a pond that needs to be cleared of Cane Toads) setting up a pile of dead Cane Toads with their bellies opened, let off a few crow calls and have a digital TV (or maybe even two or three in a circle facing in towards the Toad pile) a couple of feet away playing an endlessly repeating video of a Torresian Crow catching, flipping and tucking into a Cane Toad, so that the crows (regardless of species) who come in to feast on the Toad pile will see how it's done, and be right next to a pond loaded with Toads that they can immediately practice upon?

Cheers all!