Several years ago, I came across an article titled Six uniquely human traits now found in animals . While it was all undoubtedly interesting, tool use fascinated me the most. Until reading the article, never did I imagine that such behavior would be inherent in certain animals. The animal featured in this section of the article, the New Caledonian crow, is one of a number of species that uses tools in its search for food.

We are not talking about using ready-made tools like hammers and screwdrivers which may have been left behind by humans. Instead, it is even more ingenious as these tools are crafted by the crows themselves, from twigs and such. An excerpt from Wikipedia:

‘The ability to fashion tools has always been held as uniquely primate, distinguishing us from (apparently) less intelligent creatures. But humans and apes are not alone in having tool-making

skills. Crows amazed the science community in October when footage recorded using tiny ‘crow-cams’ on the tails of New Caledonian crows showed the birds creating advanced implements. One crow was observed whittling twigs and leaves with its beak to fashion grabbers designed to retrieve grubs from the ground.’

Intrigued, I navigated my browser to YouTube in the hope of finding footage of these birds in action. YouTube did not disappoint, displaying a fair number of results for a rather obscure subject. There are some really remarkable videos in there and after watching them, I wondered how the term 'bird brained' was coined to describe humans who have sub-par intelligence.

These birds appear significantly more intelligent and resourceful than a large number of people that I know of and have the unfortunate pleasure of working with. Let us use this video as an example. In this particular video, our corvid friend is being put to a test where it has to earn its food. Instead of food being served to it on a silver platter, it is placed into a tiny bucket which is then dropped into a tall thin beaker. The opening at the top of the beaker is much too small for the crow's head, leaving the bucket out of its reach.

So what does it do? Sit around, mope and die of hunger eventually? As pointed out earlier, the New Caledonian crow is adept at not only using tools but also making them. The crow uses a wire that is left inside the room to lift the bucket out of the glass. It is just a plain wire and using it in its present shape is just as good as not using it at all. Some ingenuity is called for.

The crow can be seen hopping around the glass, assessing the problem at hand. Eventually, it bends the wire into a suitable shape and successfully uses it to extract the bucket from within the beaker. Dinner is served. Simply marvelous, isn’t it? Even more marvelous is the fact that these birds were never trained to do this; it comes to them naturally.

Contrast this against individuals such as Ibrahim Ali and his ilk. When pitted against a problem, they behave in a rather uncouth and uncivilised manner, threatening those who disagree with them. Behavior such as this would not look out of place in the Middle Ages, which we have long since passed.

The fact is, protesting and shouting loudly is in itself not an easy task. It takes time and effort to organise these rallies and to write these hateful speeches, no matter how nonsensical they may be. If only they could channel this energy into a more productive force, perhaps they too can enjoy the fruits of their labour.