New Caledonian Crow

The New Caledonian Crow is a moderately sized crow similar in size to the House Crow but less slender looking. The bird is all black with a rich gloss to the feathers of purple, dark blue and some green in good light. The beak, feet and legs are all black too. The beak is of moderate size but is unusual in that the tip of the lower is angled up making it somewhat chisel-like in profile.

The New Caledonian Crow is classified as Least Concern. Does not qualify for a more at risk category. Widespread and abundant taxa are included in this category.

One species, the New Caledonian Crow, has also been intensively studied recently because of its ability to manufacture and use its own tools in the day-to-day search for food. These tools include 'knives' cut from stiff leaves and stiff stalks of grass. Another skill involves dropping tough nuts into a heavy trafficked street and waiting for a car to crush them open, and then waiting at pedestrian lights with other pedestrians in order to retrieve the nuts. More

The New Caledonian Crow (Corvus moneduloides) is a tool-using species of crow endemic to New Caledonia and the Loyalty Islands. These crows are some of the only non-primate animals known to invent new tools by modifying existing ones, and then passing these innovations on to other individuals in the cultural group. They have also been seen making tools that they use in the wild out of completely different material. More

In 2002 a New Caledonian crow seized a piece of wire and swiftly bent it into a hook to yank a tasty titbit from a glass cylinderWas there ever such an unruffled problem solver as Corvus moneduloides, a crow that lives in the forests of New Caledonia? In 1996 a New Zealand scientist reported that in the wild the resourceful bird made two distinct kinds of tool, one a hooked twig, the other a barbed leaf, to lever tasty grubs from woody concealment. More

But the New Caledonian crow, Corvus moneduloides, shows planning and craft unknown in any other animal but humans and our most recent ancestors. They hunt out particular kinds of plant and work careful, repeated patterns on them, like Homo erectus shaping an Oldowan flint. And they make hooks: even chimpanzees don't use hooks. They came into the news in 2002 with reports of two birds, Abel and Betty, in an Oxford laboratory. More

Tool-making New Caledonian crows have large associative brain areas. Brain, Behavior and Evolution 75, 63-70. Taylor, A.H., Medina, F., Holzhaider, J.C., Hearne, L., Hunt, G.R. and Gray, R.D. (2010). An investigation into the cognition behind spontaneous string pulling in New Caledonian crows. PLoS One 5, e9345. Taylor, A.H. and Gray, R.D. (2009). Animal cognition: Aesop’s fable flies from fiction to fact. Current Biology 19, R731-R732. More

New Caledonian crow (University of Auckland) The crows used two tools to get to their treats Problem-solving crow Crows have shown that two tools are better than one when it comes to problem solving, scientists say. A University of Auckland study has revealed that New Caledonian crows can use separate tools in quick succession to retrieve an out-of-reach snack. More

Clever New Caledonian crows can use three tools = By Rebecca Morelle Science reporter, BBC News New Caledonian crow (University of Auckland) Please turn on JavaScript. Media requires JavaScript to play. Advertisement Clever crows can use three tools New Caledonian crows have given scientists yet another display of their tool-using prowess. More

The New Caledonian crow is one of the few birds that probes for food with twigs, a form of tool use. Now, three Oxford University, England researchers have discovered that one such crow, a captive female, has gone a step further. To obtain out-of-reach food, the crow repeatedly took a piece of straight wire and bent it to create a hook. More

New Caledonian crows living in the wild do create hooked probes from twigs, but the captive crow did something very different. "To our knowledge, there are no confirmed reports of any animal making a hook out of unnatural material, such as wire, to solve a new problem," said Alex Kacelnik, a behavioral ecologist who coauthored the report with Alex A. S. Weir and Jackie Chappell. More

1 In praise of… the New Caledonian crow In 2002 a New Caledonian crow seized a piece of wire and swiftly bent it into a hook to yank a tasty titbit from a glass cylinder Editorial Was there ever such an unruffled problem solver as Corvus moneduloides , a crow that lives in the forests of New Caledonia? FULL ARTICLE AT The Guardian * Print * Share: * Share Wait... More

The New Caledonian Crow (Corvus moneduloides) is a moderately sized crow (40 cm in length) similar in size to the House Crow but less slender looking. The bird is all black with a rich gloss to the feathers of purple, dark blue and some green in good light. The bill, feet and legs are all black too. The bill is of moderate size but is unusual in that the tip of the lower is angled up making it somewhat chisel-like in profile. More

The New Caledonian crows, native to the Loyalty Islands east of Australia, use sticks in the wild to fish ants out of nests. The new research shows the birds can also use common sense, not trial and error, in figuring out how to combine available tools to retrieve a snack. More