Campus Corvids
Part of the reason for these blogs is to educate myself, the rule is I can only blog about subjects I know little about. I see something on the campus... let's say a plant or beetle, then think to myself "What the heck is that?" I then study it and blog about it.
In October I was sitting in the Julian centre coffee shop when a bird walked in through the doors - and I mean walked in - it did not fly in. It was a European Magpie, which has an easy Latin name to recall Pica pica.
Strictly speaking according to the blog rules, I knew what it was... so I can't really blog about it. But all I actually know about Magpies is their name and what they look like, Oh... and if you see two together you have to say "Hello Mr Magpie" out loud, or it's bad luck for a year? I had no idea what they eat, if they migrate, what their range is etc. So I'm bending the rules and blogging about Magpies and its relatives on site, known collectively as the Corvids (RSPB 2020)
So the Magpie in the coffee shop, was waiting outside at ten to two. It appeared to be just strolling around and looking in through the automatic sliding doors as people came and went. I don't know this but I suspect it really was looking through the glass doors not just at the glass doors. At 2pm everyone left en masse to go to lectures. About 6 students - who didn't have lectures - remained, myself included.
As the last person walked out the Magpie just strolled in, walked around and started hoovering up any crumbs, bits of sandwich or edible detritus left behind. It was bold, walked around my feet, and right up to the counter. I asked the woman behind the counter if this was common, "Yup" she said "It waits every lunchtime for people to pile out, then it just walks in". "How does it get out again?" I asked. She replied to my amazement "Oh it just waits for us to open the door for it. Or waits for someone else to trigger the automatic door"
So how smart are Magpies? Pretty bloody clever it turns out to my surprise. Most Corvids, which includes, Magpies, Jays, Rooks, Carrion Crows and Jackdaws in the UK - all of which can found on campus - are very smart, with a brain to body mass ratio not dissimilar to the great apes, octopus, whales and dolphins. The only British Corvids not seen on campus are Alpine Chuffs, Hooded Crows and Ravens.
jay jackdaw
jay jackdaw
Crow
Magpie
All the usual suspects at UEA above.
The Corvid family worldwide is very large, from the biggest at 1.4 kg ravens down to Dwarf Jays at just 41 grams. It's also a broad church of divergence, with myriad phenotypes and geographical distributed pretty much everywhere except the poles and Tierra del Fuego at the tip of S' America.
What interests me about the Magpie in the Julian centre is not so much the fact that it has learnt there is a free meal to be had in the café, sparrows can also learn to fly into a café and eat crumbs.
I have never seen sparrow wait for a sliding door to be activated, nor have the confidence to wait for a human to open it again to leave. If I approached a sparrow inside a café it would more than likely panic and fly straight into the unopen sliding glass door. I'm also not entirely sure a sparrow could look through the glass and know if the café was full of humans or virtually empty?
So as an experiment, I did walk over to the magpie in the café, the doors were closed, it could not escape, it did not panic at all. It just hopped away from me, many times, just keeping about 2 m distance. Then as it looked through the glass it saw someone approach from outside, it waited patiently by the door, while they person outside stubbed out a fag, then walked out of the automatic doors as the person came in.
My cat can only see other cats outside my window when it is pretty much has its face on the glass. If I pick up my cat indoors and stand 8 feet from the pane my cat cannot see there is another cat outside. I'm pretty sure it sees the glass and the reflections in it, but doesn't appear to be able to focus through the glass as you and I can.
My point is, if the magpie can focus through the glass from both inside and outside the café, that's quite a feat of brain power!
It wouldn't be a difficult experiment to replicate with a tame corvid, but I don't own one! So I went home and moved the bird table 20 feet from the kitchen window. Put out meal worms and seed on the table, suet balls in the tube thingy and bread and seed on the grass to lure in some regular wild visitors, jackdaws, common and black headed gulls, wood pigeon, tits and robins, then I went inside.
Results from this hastily contrived experiment?
Tits, Robins and Pigeon can only see me through the glass of the kitchen window when I'm within a meter of the window pane. gulls could only see me within 5 feet of the glass. I spooked the Jackdaws no matter where I stood in the kitchen, maximum distance I could get from glass was 12 feet away and they still saw me.
Now it could be that wild robins, pigeons and tits could see me but just weren't spooked by me. However if I'm fully visible out in the garden, the jackdaws and robins are the last to be spooked? My pigeons and tits spook easily if I'm outside.
Conclusions.
When I'm outside I'm sure robins and jackdaws know I'm not a cat, they know I have no ability to explosively leap across the lawn to get them, I'm just a rather clumsy hairless primate so I have to get closer than 10 feet to spook them. Pigeon, tits and gulls are terrified of me and won't even come onto my fence if I'm outside, but clearly cannot see me inside unless I'm closer than 5 feet to the glass.
Jackdaws aren't that scared of me outside, but if I'm inside they can definitely see me anywhere in the kitchen through the glass, and I'm apparently much more scary indoors than I am outdoors.
Oddball of the group was gulls, terrified of me outside and will not take bread off lawn, terrified of me if I'm inside and within 5 feet of glass, hence they might have a limited view through the glass into kitchen.
However, if I go outside and throw bread in the air, they will swoop to within 4 feet of my hand to pluck bread mid air, it seems seagulls also know I cannot leap into the air like a cat.
This was not in anyway a controlled experiment, just mucking about, the only thing I can say is my Jackdaws can see me through the windows into my shady kitchen in daylight even when the room is unlit indoors. It in no way accounts for lots of variables, the birds habits could be a result of what's happening in nearby gardens, maybe the pigeons are getting shot at by Mr Brown, the robins chased by Mr Pink with a shovel and the poor jackdaws are having to watch all kinds of scary depravity through the windows of the wifeswappers at No 38, Mr Green and friends!!!!
Then little wonder my jackdaws are terrified of humans behind glass.
What interests me about the Magpie in the Julian centre is not so much the fact that it has learnt there is a free meal to be had in the café, sparrows can also learn to fly into a café and eat crumbs.
I have never seen sparrow wait for a sliding door to be activated, nor have the confidence to wait for a human to open it again to leave. If I approached a sparrow inside a café it would more than likely panic and fly straight into the unopen sliding glass door. I'm also not entirely sure a sparrow could look through the glass and know if the café was full of humans or virtually empty?
So as an experiment, I did walk over to the magpie in the café, the doors were closed, it could not escape, it did not panic at all. It just hopped away from me, many times, just keeping about 2 m distance. Then as it looked through the glass it saw someone approach from outside, it waited patiently by the door, while they person outside stubbed out a fag, then walked out of the automatic doors as the person came in.
My cat can only see other cats outside my window when it is pretty much has its face on the glass. If I pick up my cat indoors and stand 8 feet from the pane my cat cannot see there is another cat outside. I'm pretty sure it sees the glass and the reflections in it, but doesn't appear to be able to focus through the glass as you and I can.
My point is, if the magpie can focus through the glass from both inside and outside the café, that's quite a feat of brain power!
It wouldn't be a difficult experiment to replicate with a tame corvid, but I don't own one! So I went home and moved the bird table 20 feet from the kitchen window. Put out meal worms and seed on the table, suet balls in the tube thingy and bread and seed on the grass to lure in some regular wild visitors, jackdaws, common and black headed gulls, wood pigeon, tits and robins, then I went inside.
Results from this hastily contrived experiment?
Tits, Robins and Pigeon can only see me through the glass of the kitchen window when I'm within a meter of the window pane. gulls could only see me within 5 feet of the glass. I spooked the Jackdaws no matter where I stood in the kitchen, maximum distance I could get from glass was 12 feet away and they still saw me.
Now it could be that wild robins, pigeons and tits could see me but just weren't spooked by me. However if I'm fully visible out in the garden, the jackdaws and robins are the last to be spooked? My pigeons and tits spook easily if I'm outside.
Conclusions.
When I'm outside I'm sure robins and jackdaws know I'm not a cat, they know I have no ability to explosively leap across the lawn to get them, I'm just a rather clumsy hairless primate so I have to get closer than 10 feet to spook them. Pigeon, tits and gulls are terrified of me and won't even come onto my fence if I'm outside, but clearly cannot see me inside unless I'm closer than 5 feet to the glass.
Jackdaws aren't that scared of me outside, but if I'm inside they can definitely see me anywhere in the kitchen through the glass, and I'm apparently much more scary indoors than I am outdoors.
Oddball of the group was gulls, terrified of me outside and will not take bread off lawn, terrified of me if I'm inside and within 5 feet of glass, hence they might have a limited view through the glass into kitchen.
However, if I go outside and throw bread in the air, they will swoop to within 4 feet of my hand to pluck bread mid air, it seems seagulls also know I cannot leap into the air like a cat.
This was not in anyway a controlled experiment, just mucking about, the only thing I can say is my Jackdaws can see me through the windows into my shady kitchen in daylight even when the room is unlit indoors. It in no way accounts for lots of variables, the birds habits could be a result of what's happening in nearby gardens, maybe the pigeons are getting shot at by Mr Brown, the robins chased by Mr Pink with a shovel and the poor jackdaws are having to watch all kinds of scary depravity through the windows of the wifeswappers at No 38, Mr Green and friends!!!!
Then little wonder my jackdaws are terrified of humans behind glass.
RSPB (2020) Royal society for the protection of birds website. Available at: https://www.rspb.org.uk/birds-and-wildlife/wildlife-guides/bird-a-z/crow-family/ (Accessed: 20/03/2020)
