The crows in your neighborhood know who you are by sight: they’re judging you, and they’re discussing you with their friends. Upset a crow enough and you may find yourself being harassed by entire flocks... for years.
How do we know this? Researchers at the University of Washington captured and tagged crows while wearing different masks with distinct faces (everybody knows crows consider capturing and tagging an egregious insult). We don’t know exactly how, but the word spread through the entire local crow population. Before long, and even years later, any researcher wearing the “bad face” mask was harassed by scores of crows not just all over campus, but throughout the entire metro area of Seattle. Even the crows who had never before seen those faces somehow knew to loudly hate on anyone wearing it.
Definitely judging you.
Crows are freakily brilliant. They solve problems requiring multiple solutions and integrated steps. They build tools from scratch. They learn from watching humans and innovate on what they’ve seen.
On the positive side, crows are known to reward kind behavior from humans. If you’re consistently nice to them, they may even start bringing you presents.
