Finger? Feather. Mmm.
There can’t be many more clear and obvious ways in which one species defiantly tells another: “GFY”, than what crows are doing to humans in parts of Europe.
And it’s even more amusing because it comes down to humans trying to tell crows exactly the same thing – and failing.
It seems that crows in Scotland, Belgium and the Netherlands have now been observed building their nests using birdspikes. Yes. This stuff:
…designed for the sole purpose of keeping birds off places where humans don’t want them, now repurposed (by those very same birds) as building material for their homes.
Incredible.
Untidy, but incredible.
When I’ve been over on Robben Island, doing beach cleanups, one of the saddest sights is the Kelp Gull nests made almost entirely out of waste plastic and fishing gear. So the idea of birds using manmade stuff isn’t new to me. But them using stuff that man made to keep birds off things is pretty special.
Many birds are known to use human-made elements in their nests. In fact, 176 different species have been documented nest building with synthetic materials, according to another study published this week in the journal Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B. Yet the birds in the Dutch study are exceptional for having taken something so purposefully built to minimize their presence and using it to rear the next generation.
In South Africa a few years back, these thing suddenly became very popular:
And they are irritating – even to humans. But I knew that their days were numbered when I saw a Red Winged Starling (Onychognathus morio) sitting on one and enjoying the spinning effect.
At the time, I thought that was amazing – and quite amusing – but it’s got nothing on the European crows.
Birds 1-0 Humans.