Tom Waits on why we are like crows (First appeared in Black Book, Sept 2002) Need you know more to click below?

Oh, crows. Well crows are like the teenagers of the bird world.

And they say the trouble with crows is that by nine o'clock they've done all their work and they've got too much time on their hands. And they will spend the rest of the day playing a primitive form of rugby. Or playing keep off the nest.

Or they'll sit and yap and chat. And they've discovered that there's no biological reason for this... but a crow will sit on an anthill until he's completely engulfed by the ants within and be in an almost hypnotic state during the the sitting.

They said the only answer they can come up with is that it's pleasure for them. That it's a form of drug abuse.

And their eyes roll back in their head and they tip their head up to the sky. They said it's part of a crow's destiny, because they've got the largest brain in proportion to their bodies of any bird and they have a lot of time on their hands.

It's inevitable there'd be a descent into drugs.

Laughs

And in this clean, antiseptic island-state, the authorities spend much time and effort shooting crows.

I grew up in a town called Crowborough - enough said.

That's pretty trippy!

Here's a weird tid bit. Some folks keep crows & ravens as pets! http://www.geocities.com/corvidranch/

ah yes. Makes sense. Certainly fits the pattern. Crows are far smarter than pigeons, and chavs are far dumber than your average human. I have often noticed how a gathering of pigeons is much like a bunch of chavs in a pub. The male pigeon will puff up his chest and strut around like he owns the gaff. He chases the females around the rooftop. The 'birds' pretend they don't want to know and hurry off just fast enough that the bloke has to do a bit of work to catch them, but not *too* fast. Occasionally two blokes will chase the same chick. Or one bloke gets in the way of another who's trying to play pool. Then a fight breaks out. Pigeons actually use a kind of straight arm wing punch to knock each other on the bonce. When the other bloke isn't watching they're not above the odd head butt either. The dirty bastards. Often, other nearby pigeons will fly over and watch the fight, urging one or the other on. Sometimes when one is obviously being beaten into submission, some of the bystanders will join in and stick the boot in to show they're on the right side. I used to enjoy watching this out the window of my flat. All much like having a working miniature of a Croyden boozer right there on the roof next door, right down to the constant squawking. I told them to shut it but the little blighters just 'graffittied' my window sill instead. Arse.