Research suggests that New Caledonian crows are capable of using tools in an indirect way to obtain food, providing evidence the birds have a reasoning ability rivalling that of the great apes. Researchers at The University of Auckland placed New Caledonian crows in a situation where they were required to carry out a sequence of tool tasks to access food. The crows had to first use a short stick to extract a longer stick from a barred box, which could in turn be used to extract out-of-reach food from a hole. The study suggested that the birds solved the task by reasoning rather than using trial and error or previous learning.
University of Auckland, NZ - Research suggests that New Caledonian crows are capable of using tools in an indirect way to obtain food, providing evidence the birds have a reasoning ability rivalling that of the great apes.
Researchers at The University of Auckland placed New Caledonian crows in a situation where they were required to carry out a sequence of tool tasks to access food. The crows had to first use a short stick to extract a longer stick from a barred box, which could in turn be used to extract out-of-reach food from a hole. The study suggested that the birds solved the task by reasoning rather than using trial and error or previous learning.
The results are published in this month's Current Biology.
"Tool use is a major turning point in species evolution," says Professor Russell Gray of the Faculty of Science. "Evidence suggests that, from the earliest human stone tools, analogical reasoning has been at the core of human innovation. Through this study, New Caledonian crows have, quite surprisingly, exhibited intelligence at the same level as the best performances by great apes on such a difficult problem.
"Crows in folklore have often been portrayed as crafty, cunning creatures. In the last few years there has been a growing appreciation in the scientific community that there may be a basis to these tales, Our results suggest crows' abilities might reflect a mix of learning appropriate procedures and more complex cognition."
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