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Crows are far from bird-brained

By Adrian Barnett

30 May 2012

Gifts of the Crow by John Marzluff and Tony Angell, Free Press, $25

HUMANS originally vilified crows and their relatives as harbingers of misfortune, and the modern view has not moved on much: winged vandals who steal windscreen wipers and gobble nestlings. Even their collective nouns sound nasty – a scold of jays, a conspiracy of ravens, a murder of crows.

But there is more to the family Corvidae than Hitchcock-inspiring horror antics, and in Gifts of the Crow, John Marzluff and Tony Angell show the birds’ positive side. Crows that mourn, give gifts and tease all serve to show…

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