--- title: Animal minds: clever crows, ravens, jays and parrots — a lesson of Mova's school · trees and pragmatics description: «Animal minds: clever crows, ravens, jays and parrots», a lesson of the biology course of Mova's primary school, sentence by sentence with dependency trees and pragmatics. It begins: Their brains are small, but the nerve cells are packed very tightly, so a crow's walnut-sized brain holds about as ma --- [Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/233-animal-minds-clever-crows-ravens-jays-and-parrots/) [home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/) / [Biology](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/) / Animal minds: clever crows, ravens, ja… # Animal minds: clever crows, ravens, jays and parrots Lesson 233 of the biology course of Mova's primary school: 16 sentences, each with its syntax tree and pragmatics. The lessons are written for Mova, and their agreed trees are part of Mova corpus 0.4 (CC BY-SA 4.0). How Mova does on its tests: [the lesson at school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/school-run/biology/233-animal-minds-clever-crows-ravens-jays-and-parrots/). - [1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/233-animal-minds-clever-crows-ravens-jays-and-parrots/1/) — Their brains are small, but the nerve cells are packed very tightly, so a crow's walnut-sized brain holds about as many as some monkey brains. - [2](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/233-animal-minds-clever-crows-ravens-jays-and-parrots/2/) — Watch a crow at a car park: it may drop a hard nut where cars drive over it, wait, and then hop out to eat the cracked nut. - [3](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/233-animal-minds-clever-crows-ravens-jays-and-parrots/3/) — Clever birds make tools, plan ahead, remember thousands of hiding places and recognise faces, and they learn from watching others. - [4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/233-animal-minds-clever-crows-ravens-jays-and-parrots/4/) — Scientists test bird minds with puzzles: a tube of water with a treat floating too low, a wire to bend, a box with several locks. - [5](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/233-animal-minds-clever-crows-ravens-jays-and-parrots/5/) — Some crows in Japan drop nuts at pedestrian crossings for cars to crack and pick them up safely when the lights stop the traffic. - [6](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/233-animal-minds-clever-crows-ravens-jays-and-parrots/6/) — New Caledonian crows make hooks from twigs to pull grubs out of holes, and a crow called Betty once bent a straight wire into a hook. - [7](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/233-animal-minds-clever-crows-ravens-jays-and-parrots/7/) — In experiments, rooks and crows dropped stones into a tube of water to raise a floating treat, like the crow in Aesop's fable, and chose stones that sink. - [8](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/233-animal-minds-clever-crows-ravens-jays-and-parrots/8/) — Crows recognise human faces; in Seattle, crows scolded a mask worn by people who had caught some of them for years and taught other crows to do it. - [9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/233-animal-minds-clever-crows-ravens-jays-and-parrots/9/) — Jays and nutcrackers hide thousands of nuts in autumn and remember most of the places months later, though the nuts they forget can grow into new trees, and jays re-hide food if another jay was watching. - [10](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/233-animal-minds-clever-crows-ravens-jays-and-parrots/10/) — Alex, a grey parrot studied by Irene Pepperberg, learned over 100 words and could name colours, shapes and numbers up to six. - [11](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/233-animal-minds-clever-crows-ravens-jays-and-parrots/11/) — Wild parrots copy the calls of their flock; a pet parrot treats its people as its flock, so it copies their words, polite or rude. - [12](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/233-animal-minds-clever-crows-ravens-jays-and-parrots/12/) — Some parrots live for over 60 years, so a pet parrot may outlive its owner. - [13](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/233-animal-minds-clever-crows-ravens-jays-and-parrots/13/) — Keas, mountain parrots of New Zealand, are very curious puzzle solvers, because food is scarce high in the mountains and exploring everything pays off, and are known for pulling rubber off parked cars. - [14](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/233-animal-minds-clever-crows-ravens-jays-and-parrots/14/) — Some magpies tried to remove a mark they could only see in a mirror, which suggests they recognise themselves, though the mirror test is argued about. - [15](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/233-animal-minds-clever-crows-ravens-jays-and-parrots/15/) — Ravens have been filmed sliding down snowy roofs again and again, apparently for fun, and they can save a tool to use later. - [16](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/233-animal-minds-clever-crows-ravens-jays-and-parrots/16/) — Pigeons have learned to tell paintings by Monet from paintings by Picasso. - ← previous: [Hidden senses: magnetic birds and turtles, ultraviolet bees, heat-seeing snakes, whiskers and lateral lines](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/232-hidden-senses-magnetic-birds-ultraviolet-bees-heat-seeing-snakes/) - next →: [Animal minds: the octopus, escape artist and puzzle solver](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/234-animal-minds-the-octopus-escape-artist-and-puzzle-solver/) - ↑ back to [Biology](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/)