If crows see a tail, she writes, they pull it. “It’s like they can’t help themselves.” It may seem like pure playfulness, but Campbell-Smith has observed the behavior in multiple different ...

A couple of years ago I was walking down my street when I noticed a dozen or more magpies lined on the roof opposite. By itself this was very unusual - whilst jackdaws are commonplace, I rarely ...

Pulling tails. Crows and ravens have a particular knack for stealing food away from other animals, often just by annoying them. Both groups are omnivorous, so they can adapt their wits to most any ...

Taylor says New Caledonian crows can, without a single mistake, pull up the string to obtain the food. This action requires them to pull up a segment of string and then step on it to prevent it ...

However despite string pulling having been documented as much as 400 years ago, researchers still do not understand what cognitive processes are used by the birds to solve the problem, says Taylor.