Crows, Ravens, Magpies - Murder, Manipulation, & Poison 

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i befriended the crows around my house so they wouldn’t harass my cat when i take him on walks outside & honestly i think it’s the best way to interact with these birds. they’re so interesting to watch once they’re comfortable around you

I was kinda expecting 'Are Ravens the best pet Dinosaur' video

I once got into a whistling battle with a crow. It was the only bird I've ever whistled at that recognized I was copying it, and proceeded to take that as a challenge. After a few back and forths chirps and twiddles, it proceeded to casually whistle a 4-octave glissando like the world's longest slide whistle, and I can only assume dropped a proverbial microphone. I've never been so thoroughly outclassed in my life.

We have been owned by a crow that sleeps in the house. He comes through the dog door at night so we got him a porch to sleep on and a ladder to get up onto it. He leaves on the morning and does his thing. Sometimes he will sit on our feet when just watching TV at night. It's pretty rad.

I know ravens are capable of mimicking other sounds and even speech, but after going for a walk during the winter in Anchorage, Alaska, over at Kincaid Park, and randomly hearing a turkey gobble sound coming from up in the trees, you can imagine I was quite confused for a short few moments. The cheeky raven in the tree was making turkey sounds....

Clint exclaiming “SOCKS!” And flinging his leg up on the table to show them off is SO RELATABLE!!!

I raised a nest of blue jays. They were loud, witty and had an obvious Sense of humor. They were great mimics, including talking. After they were released, they came around to steal, usually calling our names. They pulled the pins off the clothes lines, and preened the kid's hair. They were a joy!

I saw a raven yesterday, I thought it was a turkey vulture at first, thing was ginormous. It landed on the roof of the warehouse I work at and it had like a full sandwich it stole from somewhere, awesome.

My favorite crow fact was In Denmark (I think, it was somewhere in Europe), they were having a cigarette butt littering problem and one proposed solution was installing little trash cans that would only accept the butts and then training crows to pick up the butts and deposit them for a treat. I don't know if it was ever implemented, but one of the concerns (besides potential health impacts of the butts on the birds) was that crows, being so smart, would just use little twigs or cigaret butt shaped items to trigger the reward.

MAKE IT , MAKE THE FILM .

I’ve been befriending a group of crows. They’re extremely intelligent, and have been following me through my daily walks. Hoping they bring me some shiny gifts soon!

I feed peanuts to the local crows. I usually always wear the same hat and jacket when I go out to do so. My logic for this was that I wanted them to easily identify me. But even when I completely change my outfit, I guess they actually recognize my face or body because they chase me around, so I have to carry peanuts everywhere I go now. Even when I'm wearing my work uniform and walking to work they come after me, which is really surprising because there are a few thousand of us where I work (military) so we all look the same, yet they can still pick me out.

I mean, *we* impale our prey and cook them while (at least historically) celebrating and dancing around it. The Shrike does it with that cold, serial killer ice-stare tho too...

This video answered a question I'd had for 30+ years when as a training Geologist in the Australian outback, I discovered a grasshopper that had seemed to have flown forhead first into a spike on a bush. Now I know it was likely the work of some butcher bird.

Can we have a video just on the corvids specifically at some point? They are so awesome. One of my favorite corvid research results involves scrub jays. The researchers would put scrub jays in one of two enclosures for a few hours after they woke up. In one enclosure the jay got dog kibble for breakfast, in the other it got peanuts. After they learned this routine each jay was given the chance to cache food in the two enclosures, and they preferentially cached dog kibble in the peanut enclosure and peanuts in the dog kibble enclosure. They were able to anticipate both that they were going to be put into the enclosures the next day and what they'd get for breakfast there, but also that they might enjoy a little variety when the time came and what steps they needed to take to get it.

A group of magpies used to work together to steal the food of my mom's cat. Two would make a fuss in the garden to distract her while a third (we she didn't even know was there) came inside the house to steal food from her bowl! Fascinating birds!

As a fellow, although much less experienced biologist I can confirm that living dinosaurs are probably the most unique and interesting group of vertebrates alive today. Their incredible diversity is just one aspect of their awesomeness, but I think what really makes them special is their incredible physiological adaptations to a high-energy lifestyle and most importantly their complex and diverse set of reproductive and migrating behaviours. I started off my biology studies with birds being my least favourite group of vertebrates, but now I can't imagine anyone not being fascinated by them after actually learning about them.

Perhaps the intelligence of Corvidae could come up with a better naming convention so that we could figure out who is more closely related to whom.

I have 2 "pet" ravens. They are wild and live outside, but I have befriended them with food. They always stay in the same tree and will fly down when I call them. I call them Huginn and Muninn. They love peanuts, and they go crazy when I bring them the occasional piece of uncooked bacon.

Where I live, we have crows, magpies, ravens, blue jays, and northern shrikes. A raven pair recently settled in my neighborhood and I love hearing them gronking to each other. They fly very high as well, compared to the other city birds.

My favorite dinosaur may not be a corvid, but corvids ARE among my favorite dinosaurs.

I'm glad you mentioned apostlebirds! They were my favourites to watch while living in outback Queensland. They're extremely intelligent. I often caught them teasing corellas that got themselves stuck inside the cow feed cages. One would sit on the top of the cage outside and another would sneak in. While the one outside kept the corella's attention by squawking and jumping, the one that snuck inside would fly up of peck the corella's back. Not hard enough to ever make it bleed, just a little "tag you're it" kind of tap. They also share out food they find and are super protective around their young.

On our farm in Oregon, we have huge Common Ravens and they love our very tall Douglas Fir trees and they come down when we feed our pigs and chickens. We have about 30 of them living on our farm year round. They also occasionally kill newborn baby pigs.... They can be problematic, but they also learned that cow pies contain fly maggots, and they do very important work for us in scattering cow pies (for land fertility) and reducing fly populations. We need them on our farm, so we tolerate the occasional problems they cause for us, like pecking holes in hay tarps.

Thanks Clint. Thanks to this video I found out that both Djiti Djiti (Willie wagtails) and Dilabit (Magpie larks) are both corvids. Now I understand why they are so intelligent.

Yes, I am here for the crows and the ravens! They're my favourite type of bird! They're so interesting.

Wait a sec- ravens and crows have different social habits. Ravens are very nuclear family oriented, they bond with a mate or a human for decades. Crows are family oriented as well, but also have huge extended networks in their flocks. Both seem to communicate to family and friends of any species.

Brilliant! Yes, please make a video about corvid intelligence! They are such incredible birds!

The ravens in my backyard are incredibly smart. I see them stalking squirrels in the fall and trying to find where they hide their nuts and such.

Crows are amazing! I have some crow friends and i whistle everytime and they come flying, after a while every time i whistled one of them whistled back the same way and tone. So amazingly smart❤

I can't tell you how excited I was the day I found out "Corvinae" is a clade that includes my favorite extant theropods- genus Pica.

I actually GASPED at the problem solving corvids !!!!! I knew they were smart but I had never seen this!!! Incredible!!!

Living in Vancouver, BC, you can watch the sky at dusk and see tens of thousands of crows heading east to to their rookery. Never fails to amaze.

12:20 perfect advertisement timing 😂 Clint talks about paradise bird mating behaviour "Let's watch it." Ad cuts to a car with 3 guys and a woman. One of the guys eats chocolate while looking at her, the others are beatboxing.

i'm really into these loosely-related tangents on completely other subjects. bagpipes in the squid video? alright! brief english history lesson while describing shrikes? right on! it's a nice little surprise

A FEATURE LENGTH FILM!?!??!!!??? love how you guys just dropped that outta nowhere like it's no big deal. so excited!

My favourite are the currawongs. Fearless intelligent and big yellow eyes.. and what a beautiful song.. I love butcher birds and Magpies too (Australian birds )

Amazing video as always my friend! The Hawaiian Crow is my favorite corvid. Also I’m not sure if it was the clip you used or it was your decision but having “Puttin’ On The Ritz” over the Birds of Paradise was a genius decision.

I am really glad that people are into that kind of thing Love the direction of covering phylogenetics over reviewing reptiles. That said! I miss seeing the lil cuties hanging out while I daydream about having more reptiles than I can afford!

SO EXCITED!!! This group contains my favourite animals in the entire world! I've been asking for this group for SO LONG. Hurray! I work with corvids (three common ravens who live at the falconry centre I vollunteer at.) and they are something else, so smart and emotional. They've started imitating Harris' Hawks distress calls for attention lately.

Thanks Clint, now I have Young Frankenstein scenes playing in my head because of the birds of paradise. I learned about butcher birds through The Red Wall Abbey series from Brian Jacques. Vicious & smart little birds.

Awww yes, dancing birds, classic

So excited for this! I love corvids! Also, love the socks Clint 🦖

I LOVE THESE BIRDS!! Our neighbors had Joey and he could sing songs.. some of which were the 60's hit song 🎵"Wipe-out" ( no lyrics just guitar and drums) and "Georgie Girl"🎵 and "The bridge on the river Kwai" with the popular theme song done all in whistles.. no really...a choir of people whistled the song. No lyrics, just whistles! Joey lived over 30 years... he was awesome. They go through the drive-thru at McDolalds for free french fries!😅😅

As an avid birdwatcher, thank you for the bird videos! I love them!

Go corvids! These birds are so amazing! Thank you so much for diving into this family. Also, I didn’t know shrikes were part of it. Can’t wait for the other birds! I’m really curious about the birds that seem to be born with a degree in civil engineering, like the social weavers.

Where i live in the South of England we have Ravens, Carrion Crows,Rooks,Magpies,Jackdaws and Jays. The only ones we are missing is the Chough. We don't get Shrikes that much here anymore, in fact I think the Redback Shrike is for all intents and purposes extinct here.

Crows, ravens and magpies oh my. We kept pigeons when I was young and the worst thing is we used to catch the western ravens trying and often succeeding at opening the aviary door to get and kill them. They would eat them, they’d just kill them. Intelligent creatures but major murderous pains in the butt. Those “fan tails” at least in the west we call them Willy Wag Tails. They are also vicious little bastards, they don’t seem to mind humans but won’t tolerate the presence of other corvids it’s funny to see one chasing a murder of western ravens because one raven is at least 4 times the size of a wagtail but the wagtail will easily chase a murder of ravens off. Also are lyrebirds corvids as well? They are the birds that can imitate almost any sound spookily accurately.

The fact that corvids act like prehistoric humans probably did is really fascinating. I would love to go a few million years into the future to see how they end up evolving!

When I see a thumbnail putting Australian Magpies under Corvoidea I know I’m either going to be very annoyed or amazingly surprised… let’s see which one it is Edit: Answer: very annoyed … hmm, okay, maybe not very annoyed, but like Clint, sweetie, Australian Magpies and the rest of Artamidae are not under Corvoidea

We have Butcher Birds in Australia too but I think they are more related to our Magpies and Currawongs than Africas Butcher Birds. If I’m wrong about this someone please let me know as I’m no expert and am only remembering what I read in books.

Corvids are the coolest. I had 3 crows as pets when i grew up. Amazing animals. Sadly only shila made it and got her own Nest when she Was adult. She came back once, years later with a wounded wing. Stayed till it healed and left for good. I had tears of Joy in my eyes, that she remembered us and knew she could return.

I had a brilliant professor in college who did a great lecture on animal intelligence. They were let go when it was discovered they were a group of crows stacked on top of eachother in a trench coat.

Clint has made a terrible mistake, one that can only be rectified through an entire video dedicated to the amazing bird which is the Australian Magpie, which is not, I repeat is not, under Corvoidea!

A video of my favorite birds on my birthday, great timing!

Australia here. Drongos visit my garden every year. I assume they migrate here annually. I am watching and listening to crows as I write this. There are a bunch of other birds in the garden, truly blessed.

oh, we have butcherbirds in australia too (though presumably a different genus using the same name). Our magpies are butcherbirds, not corvids, even though they have the same body and beak morphology as the typical crow; then we have pied and grey butcherbirds, which are more like the ones you show, smaller but with a little grasping hook on the end of the beak. Formidable though! One of my quails got out of my aviary once and the first I knew was the parrots shrieking an alarm call - I got to the window in time to see a the quail huddled right at the door of the aviary and a grey butcherbird hardly larger than he was swooping down on him. By the time I could get out of the door they were both gone, leaving only a bloodstain.

The crows around my home in Florida are always in groups. I call them the wolves of the sky. They are very smart. They raid the other birds nests for the babies to eat them. More than once I see them flying over with one in the claws. They even have dropped them in my pool, but never get them out of the pool once dropped. This is curious to me because I know they can get it out.

Magpies are great

Corvids are without a doubt my favorite group of animals. Their intelligence, personalities, and just some of their appearances are just amazing to me.

13:45 few people know this but they were infact the first birds to invent molded thermoplastic they actually use them as defense against larger animals by dropping lego blocks around their nesting aera so that larger animals will trod on them in the middle of the night and be caused much pain ... they're also known as the lego minefield bird

Yes!! This is the best :D birds are pretty fly.

Thank you so much! I love the video! I also really like your idea for video all about Corvid intelligence. If you got really ambitious you could make it a 🧠'battle of the bird brains'☢ between Corvids and parents, but I agree studies on Corvid intelligence alone could fill a whole video. Keep up the great work.

My mom used to have a few chickens, and she was constantly scared of hawk attacks until she started feeding a large group of crows who would act as guard-crows for her chickens.

Hey I found another case of messed up common names indirectly from this video. We have shrikes and butcher birds in Australia but they aren't closely related to those from Laniidae. They look very similar with local butcher birds being almost identical both in appearance and behaviour. These bird videos are my favourite because it reminds me of how lucky I am to be a bird enthusiast living in Australia. Aside from the birds of paradise and the true shrikes I think I have at least one species from all of these groups either visiting regularly or actively living on my property. I have 2 families of Australian magpies living in my backyard. I leave water out for them and dried mealworms as a treat sometimes. Even when they have babies and fledglings they are pretty relaxed with our pressence. We sometimes get Australian ravens come past which are incredibly common in urban areas but less so where we are. I've also seen a Currawong or 2 which looks like a corvid is about as smart but is only distantly related, which I also just learnt fact checking before posting this comment. Currawongs look like Australian Ravens but slightly smaller with bright yellow or red eyes and have a song that's even nicer than an Australian magpie. I also get 2 species of black cockatoo and 3 other species of cockatoo regularly, not to boast or anything.

I loveeee seeing Philippine endemics here like the following: 5:20 ish, one of the pied fantails here might be a Philippine pied fantail (Rhipidura nigritorquis) - Marya kapra 5:29 Visayan blue fantail (Rhipidura albiventris) 9:08 Celestial monarch (Hypothymis coelestis) And some migratory/non-endemic native bird like the Japanese paradise-flycatcher, black-naped monarch etc...

Fantastic video!! I've beem waiting for one about these guys :)! Really cool to learn where they originate from. And YES on a video on corvid intelligence!!! Would love to see it! I am however confused with the lumping of crows, rooks, and ravens together as arbitrary types of the same species. Would you be able to explain that a bit more? I know in some places, the terms rook, raven, and crow are loosely applied terms because they are all just loud, black birds. However where I'm from, people seem to make more of a distinction. Rooks, crows, and ravens all have different beak shapes, with rooks having pale colours around their tall and wedgelike beak, crows having small and slightly curved beaks, and ravens having really large and curved beaks. All of these birds have completely different vocalizations than one another, too. Rook calls are rather strained and gull-like, as well as having an assortment of rattles at varying cadences. Crows have pitched, scratchy caws at a medium to fast intervals and quick trills of clicks. Ravens have a huge variety of calls that range from slow, deep and croaken, rapid knocking, and even to sounds like a plucked strung instrument. Rooks, crows, and ravens all also have pretty different plumage. Crows are very sleek, whereas ravens (and to some extent, rooks) carry their feathers such that they look heavy and scruffy. And last but not least are the sincere behavioural differences. Ravens soar and do tricks like diving and spinning in the air, throwing food between their feet and mouth as they carry it home. They also tend to be very solitary, always flying around as a pair with their mate. Crows on the other hand stay in huge flocks and move from place to place as they scour around for food, don't do tricks, and aren't able to soar. So, why are these birds considered to just be the same? They seem so different to me. Thanks in advance! Sorry for the long read haha :)

I have been the lucky recipient of a gift from a corvid. The last place I lived, I had a garden and was able to feed birds, amongst them rooks and European magpies. One day, I found one single ipod lying next to the sunflower seed bowl. The most probable way for a single ipod to end up there, has to be as a gift from one of the birds.

This was one of my favorites out of all your years of videos (and congratulations on that anniversary, by the way). I am so looking forward to the rest of your bird videos, and i will be absolutely ready to curl up in a blanket for that nine hour film!

Feeling like the Australians are going to be educating you again, Clint ;)

Oh excellent!!! Some of my favorite birds! Please do the birds faster! What are some of the ancestral traits as opposed to derived traits we see outside of the ancestral range?

As you say, Edward I might have had lovely curls but was a total badass. He was 6ft2 and had an incredible temper. He was once captured by his enemies but escaped and then beat them in a later battle. He went on crusade after that and fought in the holy land. A hashishin assassin tried to kill him and broke into his rooms while he slept but Edward woke and fought hand to hand, killing the legendary assassin. He became king after the crusade and conquered Wales and then set about Scotland. One of his names was Malleus Scotus - the hammer of the scots. Pretty cool really.

Crows (and ravens and also rooks i guess but nobody ever talks about rooks) are my favorite birds to just sit back and watch where I live. I love their intelligence, their stark, black color, I find their caws and calls just very soothing and therapeutic, I love watching them scavenge, fly and perch on leafless trees in groups, and you can get fairly close to them without spooking them, but they will fly away once you get too close, and I feel very comfortable with that distance. I'm fascinated by the perceptions that human cultures have had of them, and to me they represent the beauty and calm of nature. They come out most around Autumn, which is pretty cool because autumn seems to be when there's just lots of stuff on the ground like leaves, nuts, and insects for them to scavenge, and they perch on trees that often have lost their leaves, which to me at least represents the circles of life, what dies is scavenged and feeds the next generation of life. And their intelligence, curious but cautious nature, the comfortable distance I mentioned, is very cool to me. And their black color and kind of edgy, arcane connotations kinda makes them seem kinda metal which makes them even cooler. Perhaps I am so fascinated and intrigued by these amazing corvids because I see so much of myself in them. I've always been someone more interested in watching and observing animals in nature than having and taking care of a pet myself. Perhaps that's why so many other humans have also been intrigued by them, perhaps the kind of personality drawn to observing them the most is almost reflected by their nature.

Thank you for another spectacular episode, Clint! I think the Mos Eisley Legonester may be a contender for best pet dinosaur (maybe come April?). Looking forward to the lepidosauria film!

Aussie Magpies aren't Corvoids. In the family Artamidae I think Some Heron species also bait fish

I love your phylogeny videos so much! Keep going! Can't wait for the film!

I've been waiting for this one! Thank you.

haven't watched the video yet but the thumbnail is an Australian Magpie. they're non corvid passerines right?

I’m absolutely loving this series!

I discovered your channel a few days ago, and I just can't stop. So educational and entertaining.

Wow!!! That was sooo much information!

This is a group of birds which have interspecies communication and organization, have seen magpies, jackdaws and crows work together to reach a common goal. as drive out the Black-headed gulls from park and then they shared the food after the gulls was gone. also seen them work together to drive of a cat or a fox. Plus break into a trashcan. This birds are scary smart.

I really hope you get to the Artamidae soon, particularly Cracticinae, and cover Australian Magpies, Butcherbirds, and Currawongs. Also please talk about the Australian crow and raven species.

i love just how epic and fun educational content has gotten. I feel like growing up science was presented as something that just needed to be learned. you show it as something that can be raved about. something that can be enjoyed.

I had no clue blue jays were in the family corvidae, or that they could MIMIC HUMAN SPEECH!? they have now become my favorite birds

I love this ultradense content. So entertaining, educational and exhausting at the same time.

Thanks for talking about by favourite birds! ❤

18:26 even the chair sounded like Rexie

A large theropod behaving like a butcher bird with its human kills would be awesome dinosaur horror movie material

This is the episode I've been waiting for!!! Just watched some corvids fly off in their morning commute. Gotta love 'em, they're so cute. ❤😊❤

Thank you Clint. This was fascinating.

THANK YOU FOR MAKING THIS VIDEO!!!!!

Yesterday morning I saw two crows and a magpie in my garden and thought "wouldn't it be great if Clint did a video on corvids". I'm now assuming they were part of your marketing team :D

Love the content!

That's a lot of interesting information you have covered and are going to cover. Gratefully subscribed.

YESSSS!!!I've been looking forward to this video for a while now!!

I woke up and got very excited ❤ my FAVORITE!

Never thought I’d be watching a bird mating dance while an instrumental of “Puttin’ on the Ritz” plays in the background but here we are.

LOVE this videos! Go Clint!!!

These are my favorite birds ❤. I know you have so many to get through but you could do so much with corvids. They are fascinating! ❤