Communication B-eakthrough! Eureka! (part 1)

If you read this blog, then you know that I have been teaching Fig, gradually, but consistently (not my best attribute usually). What have I been teaching her? Specifically, 13 colors, which I have given single or double syllable names. Some of the names are Japanese, some are derived from Japanese, some are picked from Crow language, or from phonics. I may need to change some of them over time.

ah-white, ko-black, ha-brown, ka-pink, arr-silver/gray, rah-gold, no-clear, aka-red, oh-orange, ki-yellow, do-green, ao-blue, oa-purple, is that 13?  

My wife has complained several times: Why don't you just teach Fig English words for the colors. Wouldn't that be much more interesting? You were listening to a talking Crow on the internet the other day. That was cool! 

I have explained this to her several times now, but she is either not as interested in Crows as I am, or she is not so impressed with my braininess. She sarcastically called me Professor the other day, in fact. She has a great sense of humor. I am not a professor.  

Anyway here is what I am up to. If it makes any sense at all...well, I leave that up to you to decide. Suggestions, comments, and what-not are always welcome.

Why new words? Why not human language? I am after all, an English teacher.

Well, you have to go back to the beginning. When I first got Fig, on her first day of fledging, when she badly broke her already wounded and infected wing, she was already indoctrinated into the world of Crows. She spoke fluent Crow in fact. I had heard that Crows could, that's COULD learn to mimmick human language, but I had no idea if, or when Fig would be likely to do so. I was just as curious about her Crow language as I was to know if she would speak human. So, at first, of course, we (my family) mimmicked her. This was only natural.

The next step in my mind was to wonder, hmmm, are we just mimmicking, or are we really talking? Are we communicating? Let's see if she will mimmick our words. The obvious choice was, hello, right? I mean, it's useful and a bit endearing. Much to my surprise, Fig started mimmicking hello in short order, after less than two weeks. Her pronunciation was and is far from perfect, but she's keeping at it.

The next step in my mind was to seriously deeply wonder, hmmm, is communication possible, and if it is, how will I know when it really happens for sure? So I started making experiments. I would teach Fig with flashcards daily. Gradually, she is repeating more and more. She loves language time. She gets very excited. Study time for her can go for about an hour. That seems to be her limit for language study, then she wants to preen, and prepare for bed. Me too. 

Anyway, I thought a lot about how to go about communicating with a Crow, and it quickly became obvious to me from my experience with Fig, that it would be of great benefit to identify sounds which she can easily say if communication is to go both ways. I looked carefully at English and Japanese languages, and I chose names for the thirteen colors which I wanted to know IF Fig could actually utter. She is still struggling with saying some of them, so I did not do a great job. For now though, I am plugging ahead with the original color name list, in hopes that Fig will do better, while simultaneously mining vowel pairs for new phonic sounds she takes to naturally. I anticipated that Fig might never speak a word, then I anticipated that Fig might have trouble with uttering some sounds, so it is a process of discovery. What are her capabilities?

To date, Fig can say most of the colors, and she knows/understands all of them. How do I know this? I give her a selection of colors, anywhere from 2-13, and she picks out the correct color when asked to do so. Her accuracy, and or enthusiasm goes way down as the number of colors goes up, but she is only one, and she is improving daily. We don't get much practice time, but we do some study together each day at least 5-10 minutes.

So, Fig can learn abstract names for colors. Yes. But, it was only recently that I had an amazing break through with her. I started coloring opaque yogurt cups in the 13 colors. Sort of a larger version of the smaller games we were already playing. Then I put a few of them on a tray, or around her space. A snack was under one of the cups. I picked Fig up, and told her one of the colors. She went to the tray or around her space and proceeded to peck the cups randomly. At my urging she kept trying, and turned the cups over one by one, eventually discovering the snack. It took her a while to figure out that sometimes the snack was under the cup, and sometimes it was stuck up in the cup. I did both these things to help her learn to really look and examine the cup carefully. But what was this random searching she was doing?

The problem was, she was not listening to me. Unlike in the color selection game where the selection was right in front of her, this cup game was somehow different. Perhaps the fact that the cups were away from me, and her, at some distance, around her space made them detached from the conversation we were having. So communication totally broke down. I would say, Yellow, and she would go ravage the cups randomly. I simply could not understand why. What was the disconnect? What was going on? One minute it seemed as though Fig and I were really communicating; she was gently, civily choosing from a selection, then suddenly the magic was gone, and she is randomly ravaging through colored cups, totally ignoring what I have trained her to understand, and carefully informed her about before letting her make a choice.

So, next, I tried a bit of a mean trick. I put snacks under all of the cups, but only one contained a real snack. I wrapped all of the "snacks" rather thoroughly in tough papertowel. Now, Fig had to go to some trouble to unwrap the snacks. She spent several long minutes tearing through paper only to get a bit of an unappetizing popsicle stick. She looked at me like, What's going on here? Why are you doing this to me? Eventually, she'd get her snack, but only after a lot of wasted effort. I kept telling her the right cup, but for some stubborn reason, she still was not getting it. Fig I would say, this is just like the smaller game. Listen to me! But I could not connect. Communication had broken down, and was failing for some reason. Over here, I tell her, red. Then over there, it's like the conversation never happened.

Finally, I decided to show her some color cups. As usual, we reviewed the color names. Then, I did something differently. I took away the cups, and in their place I put identical, plain packages wrapped in paper towel, but only one contained a snack, just as before. As usual, I picked Fig up, and I told her the answer to where the snack was, red, or purple, or whatever. For some reason, I could see, it was like a light went on in her eyes, it was that Ah ha! moment when she suddenly understood that I was giving her information. She went right for the correct package every time! For some reason, giving her information that was there previously was the logical bridge across the straights of confusion. I was no longer speaking about the present, obviously, because there were no color cups, I was speaking about something both of us remembered in the past, so she was no longer able to dismiss my chatter as merely chatter, and she realized that I was giving her important information about the present. She clearly understood that I must be referring to what was there a minute ago, because right now, the thing I heard him refer to isn't even there!

Doing this experiment caused some switch to flip in Fig's mind. When she looks at me now, I see she is hanging on my every word. Her expression is, What is he going to say next? It's an amazing connection to make, and I do believe it is one way to demonstrate that one has successfully communicated.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But what about the 13 odd words I am teaching her. I simply had no way to know if Fig would ever speak when I started, but I had an indication that Fig could learn abstract language, and associate it with real life objects. So, I chose words that would be easy for her to say, and hear/distinquish from a distance. Remember that I was hoping that she could go out on her own. If she never learned to speak, I could still hope to communicate with her by voice, and perhaps a reading system.

You'll notice that none of the words contains uu, as in Oooh lala, or eh as in Elephant. Have you ever heard a Crow say those sounds? Me neither. So I left them out. It turns out that three sounds on my original list are sounds Fig can't say, or won't say, yet. Can you guess what they are? It will probably surprise you to learn that Ka, Ki, and Aka are the most difficult for her to say. Crows may caw, but they do not in fact say "ka". Crows say "aw". Fig is trying hard to get me to change aka to awa, which is a color she really likes, but so far she has not suggested anything for Ka, pink, or Ki, yellow. What to do?

I thought the phonic sounds I chose would be easy for Fig to say. Turns out some are not. The search for easy words phonic sounds goes on.  I am mining for new phonics she likes. I may have to change her color alphabet in the future if I discover simpler phonics.

I still have no idea how much, or how well Fig will do with speech in her life time. So, my idea was to teach her 13 phonic sounds, which happen to represent colors. If Fig did not learn speech well, those colors could later to be used to communicate via "writing and reading". The thirteen basic phonics function secondarily as an alphabet, and the colors ARE the letters. So, if I show Fig two yellow cards, that makes the word KiKi. This word currently has no meaning, but in the future, it may. By combining phonics, and colors into an alphabet I am able to skip a step in the path towards communicating with Fig. I have no idea if this has ever been done before, I have read about studies where animals use symbols and signs, I am not sure if this is a different idea or not, but this is why Fig is NOT learning English. If I teach her English, she will need to learn all the words, then the grammar, then the writing and reading. Do you think that is possible? No? Nor do I.

Hopefully one day, Fig will be able to take color cards and arrange them into words. Or maybe I will show her a color card arrangement that means chicken and fish, and she can choose what's for dinner. Whatever the outcome, it is a lot of fun trying to talk to the animals.

When Wild Animals Attack! Zow!!!

Fig has been with me for almost a year. My goal with this permanently injured Crow, as I stated previously, has always been to try to raise her as semi-independent. That is, I wanted to provide for her, a home, or a place to sleep, with food and water, and some social life, but I wanted her to be able to enjoy being a Crow, living outside, essentially free to roam, and jump about in the trees around our neighborhood. She is after all perfectly smart enough to evade cars and cats, and most crazy humans. She is no dumby.

Unfortunately, that dream, that goal came to a sudden crashing end this weekend, but please don't worry. Fig is fine; only the dream of freedom has been scratched from the drawing board. Why?

Well, on Saturday, I let Fig out. I gave her a choice, stay or go out. From time to time I would simply set her free to test our bond, and her will to go free. It was a risk, but she is a wild animal, and I really wanted to respect that, and let her remain so. She has been out a few dozen times over the last year. As usual she chose to go out. A frolic in the tree proves irrisistible to her. So, off the balcony she leapt, into the four story high tree by our building. And, there she sat.

A year ago, she would have been animated, hyper, a bit panicked, watching me highly suspiciously, looking for the next step towards freedom, and cawing like crazy for a rescue from her family if she was out free in the tree, but not so today. Now she sits quietly, mostly, talking to her family near by as they come and go, but also walking towards me from time to time, and conversing with me in the words only the two of us use daily, for colors, and a bit of English too. I have to say, it was one of the highlights of my life to see her, a wild, injured Crow, sitting free in the tree, being a beautiful, free, independent, real-deal bird. And it moved me deeply, her not fearing me, and taking the time to come and chat with me, when there were so many other Crows about in the atmosphere, coming and going, busy with breeding season duties, with whom she could have asked for cawfee.

Alas, after two hours in the fresh, light green, spring leaves of the tree, with the warm firey sunshine burning into her back, having snapped her beak at a few curious flies, and called enthusiastically to some siblings busy helping her parents with this year's nestlings, Fig retreated to the cool shade beneath the canopy where she sat among the branches, playfully toying with some of the old dry branches, breaking them off, fiddling about with them, then dropping them to the cool earth below. Then the needle really scratched across the record, and the music completely stopped! Terror from the skies! 

It was a surprise attack, and an attack in earnest by two massive Crows. But who was it? This is Fig's family territory. They know her! Could that be? I suddenly realize that one of the Crows is Fig's dad. So, the other must be an older, or same age sibling. But, why would they attack Fig? For whatever reason, they were out to make a statement, and the mission was accomplished; the message was received, like no other, for it was very nearly written in blood. These two large Crows, out of nowhere, actually appearing out of thin air, silently, stealthily, like Ninja's in the night, but in broad daylight no less, they fell down into that tree in unison, a pair in total collaboration, having conspired, planned and implemented their dreadful, sinister, coniving, traitorous, betrayal. Like a growling, thunderous, branch snapping, snarling pair of shadowy Tigers, they fell down through the canopy landing beaks first, crashing down with their full weight upon poor unsuspecting Fig. Incredible. No one. No one, can sneak up on a Crow...but a Crow! It was utter, stony silence on an almost windless day. They rolled and tumbled through the tree like a giant feathery meatball of fume and fury, then split apart snarling, alighting on different branches. Sheer terror! Nooooooo! I screamed, waving my arms wildly. Ah ha! They did not know I was there! They were so surprised, Fig had a chance. Very luckily, I managed to quickly get an eye lock on which Crow was Fig, my eyes wildly darting Crow to Crow, otherwise the battle may have been lost. She dove through the trees and onto the next building's roof, her attackers standing confused, each a bit dazed, staring mistakenly at the wrong Crow after their disorientation in the tumble. In an instant more, Fig was up the ten-foot-tall TV antennae, surveying every inch of her surroundings. No good. The scoundrels were on her again, divebombing from the air like a pair of WWI aces, in perfect order, a one two punch. Fig needed a miracle, AND, she'd have it! She really would.

For the first time ever, Fig flew!!! She really, really flew! I think I flew a bit too leaning out over the stairwell's edge into space. Who wouldn't? I almost leapt into that tree to rescue poof Figgy. She did not gain a centimeter of altitude as she crossed the parking lot, and then the street, but she flew straight as an arrow, and she flew far. Her incredible flight just went on, and on. It was like a sports movie's climatic moment, where everyone's jaw drops, and there is ten seconds of complete, utter stunned continuous silence, then replay, replay, replay. For crying out loud, she has no cartilage in one elbow!  How could she fly? My son and wife happened to be watching from the balcony, and they saw the whole thing. My son yelled, That's Figgy! And my wife said, No, it can't be. Fig can't fly. But she did! And the effort exhausted her.

She alighted on a power pole's wire, quickly remaneuvering to the top of the pole, looking for multiple excape routes. I was down the stairs, out the door, and into the street as quick as an Olympic athlete, at her side, for her defense. Crows are cowards in the face of an aggressive human, but these two were out for blood at all costs. I called Fig to come down quick, and she wanted to, but she also knew instinctively that down, was also, possibly, out, as in lights out for her. She'd have had no chance at all in a brawl on the ground. A dangerous gamble. Come on. Come on. No good. Incoming!!! But Fig was ahead of the game this time, her senses hightened. Off she went again. This time not quite so far. Obviously, she was exhausted from the surprise, the rush of adrenaline, her long flight, and the fear of death struck into her.

She flew to a nearby apartment's walkway, only making the second floor. She had started up on the fourth floor hieght, so she wasn't doing badly in the flight department with terror and adrenaline driving her will for survival. In comes the airforce again and again, I don't know how many times, twisting and turning, grabbing, and pouncing, snarling, growling, grawwk, rawww, akkk, gonk!!!! Go away, intruder!!! Then Fig's dad took a perch one story up, on the walkway wall, looking down on Fig who he once knew well enough, but apparently had forgotten, or forsaken. The other Crow took a perch a couple buildings away, resting up for the next attack. Fig's dad grocked loudly at her, making as if he would pounce down upon her at any moment, chasing her the full length of the walkway from above. Fig gronked back at her dad, but softer, and she struck an odd pose which I interpreted to be one of sexual submission, complete surrender. She squatted down, head forward, grawking softly, wings trembling, shuddering, tail raised up, softly growling. It seemed she was sending a mixed message. I am submitting you fuck, now back off!! It was a piteous sight. It felt very much like she was saying, Dad, it's me! Don't you remember me? She seemed frustrated and flabbergasted, in disbelief, as was I.

I took a moment to connect with her dad with my eyes, and my body language. What are you doing? I pleaded? And it seemed for a short moment that he was slowly recalling who Fig was, and lightening his tone. He turned his head reflectively as if to entertain my querry, then flew off when a man came down the walkway.

A man from a store had come out the backdoor to check what all the Crowmotion was. He quickly spotted Fig, and the imposing monster Crow above her on the balcony before he'd taken to the air again. Having a sudden chance presented, I quickly asked him if he had a key to the stairwell. Amazingly, he did! In his pocket! He opened the door, and  I ran to meet Fig on the second floor walkway. Still trembling with fear, she was not ready to come to me. She ran back down the walkway wall, and leapt a meter out onto the wobbly powerline. That instability was the sign  for the sibling to commense with the dive bombing. I saw it coming from the building down the road a ways, and Fig's dad was coming round again. Waving my arms I managed to fend them off well enough, but Fig's dad landed a diving grab, causing Fig to lose her balance, so she jumped to the banister of balcony stairwell around the corner of the same building. I opened outside stairwell door slowly, so not to startle her, but she could see the fruit stand from there, our usual meeting place. She flew down. Startled by a cyclist, she opted to land on the gate of a garage door, then jumped to the ground, and ran to the fruit stand where she hid behind a sign. That was our usual meeting place, and I knew she'd let me collect her there, and she did. She did not even pant in my arms, but she was trembling with andrenaline coursing through her muscles for the last 20-30 minutes. I lost track of the time.

The terrifying ordeal was over. Fig was still alive, only having suffered a couple of badly twisted feathers on her bad wing which was an easy grab. It took her nearly two hours to calm back down though, and perhaps more tragically, my hope and dream for her partial freedom, and independence was dashed, right then and there; a total loss. My heart sank.

Why did her own family attack her? There are many possible explanations. Maybe, they forgot her. Maybe, they forsook her. Maybe, because it is breeding season, and chicks are in the nest currently, the defense hormones are running ultra high, and it's take no chances. That is nature's cruel way. Perhaps they heard Fig talking to me, and got pissed off, or thought she must be foreign. Whatever the reason, message recieved. I cannot have Fig facing that on her own. She would simply never survive it. I am lucky she did not end up a bloody pulp this day. You do not get that lucky twice. She is a tiny, sweet female Crow, not a big imposing ape of a male. She'd have no chance.

There is now a roof over Fig's balcony, where only one third of one had previously been. I'll need to put in some windows or screens to give her some chance at a view of her surroundings, and the sky. It is a heartbreaking way to come round on a year with this incredible bird. But the story is not over. I'll have to get her out in the sun another way.

The irony though is that the biggest threat to this animal, who had no friends to begin with, and no love in this cold, bothersome world, save from me and the trees, was her own family...I never expected this. I never entertained the thought because up to this day, Fig was well remembered, accepted, and given quite an obvious show of sympathy from her family. Obviously, that has expired. Nothing can be done.

Boy, if I had only had a sliver of memory on my iPhone, and had managed to somehow catch that attack on video...Wow! That was seriously one of the scariest 30 minutes of my life. It is one of those moments I will never forget. Having read about aggression in Crows many times, but having never seen it in the slightest...this experience is unique.   

Mining Double Vowels for Easy Phonics

Teaching a bird to talk is a rather silly undertaking, I think, if one expects one's efforts to result in a conversing bird that is, but the experience of trying is one of the funnest things I have ever done, and I feel like I am learning some things about communication along the way.

First, I have learned that the brain is limited. Obviously, I knew this from my own brain, and it's report cards already. But what I am observing in Fig is showing me something about the way brains adapt to living with limitations, or at least the way our head's break up living through a dangerous day into manageable parcels. A bird is a much more desperate animal than a human. They are living airplanes. So, they can only keep so much fat on reserve. As such, their food bank is small. Finding food is essential, in short order. As Fig's parent, I find that hardly 15 minutes goes by during the day that I don't think about her next snack when I am home with her. The point is that birds have to stay on task, much more so than us humans. Even we don't have it that good (unless you live in America where the majority of us manage to carry around a few extra pounds). I probably go to the kitchen every 10 minutes myself. Probably shouldn't. Anyway, there is a lot of stress in life, and that revolves mainly around the issue of food, and that stress is ingrained in our psyches from past millenia. It would be hard to live with that level of stress all the time. So brains break the day into a schedule automatically. I am sort of keeping tabs on what a Crow's natural schedule is. It is very much more apparent than a human's inner schedule. A Crow's schedule is broken into several distinct parts, which I am only just beginning to map out. It's interesting and exciting, but more interesting perhaps, is that observing this in the Crow has made me more aware of the existence of my own human inner schedule which I have basically ignored since birth. Our brains actually schedules moods, energy levels, and activities in order to break up stress into manageable packets, while ensuring we expend enough energy to find sustenance. If I want to interact with Fig, I have to take these things into consideration, just as I need to choose the right time to chat with my boss. I think this inner schedule gizmo is probably way more important than we consider. Pretty much we simply ignore it in the artificial environment we inhabit now-a-days. Maybe we should not. Maybe we should rediscover it.

Second, teaching Fig, or trying to is making me a better teacher for human kids. I use the same techniques with kids that I use with Fig, and some things I have tried with Fig have carried over to the human classroom. The dual teacher life I lead, animal, and human, has reinforced the technique of starting with simple concepts and gradually increasing the complexity in order to step learners upwards on the learning ladder. For example, as an English teacher, I start with kids by teaching some core vocabulary. Then that progresses to making choices from two. Then choices from three. Then multiple choice. Then fill in the blanks. Then produce original language. It is the same with teaching Fig, though my successes with her language ability have been rather small to this point. More importantly is that she knows when language time is, she gets excited to do it, she enjoys it, and she plays with the language I have introduced in unexpected ways, and more and more she blurts it out before I am asking her for it. That is the same thing I want my human students to do, ultimately, to own, and play with language.
Language itself is a farse. For example, in English, my favorite, we say upwards, downwards, inwards, outwards, forwards, backwards, and sidewards. Wait, rewind. Sideways. You see, it all makes no real logical sense. So, language must therefore be secondary in importance to communication, and that is exactly what language teachers need to remember because not everyone can learn all the words, in fact, no one of us can learn all the words, so it is of uttmost importance that we learn to improvise, and be resourceful, and creative with the tools in our box, and flexible towards other communicators. Perhaps misspelling a word is a clever idea. It might represent progress. We should not laugh; we should open our minds to truly connect and communicate with others.

Thirdly, to expand on the final point above. Fig is limited in what sounds she is able to utter. This is natural, and not to say that she will not overcome all, or some of her limitations with time. I should press on, and motivate her to keep trying, but I should also meet her half way.  I started her out with a few words, and commands, gestures, and 13 colors to which I assigned "simple" sounds that I thought would be easy for her. Not all the sounds are in fact easy for her, and she likes some much more than others, but she tries to say all of them. Note, we get a very very limited amount of time to practice each day. What is interesting of late however, is that I am gradually gathering a collection of sounds which are easier for her to say. Most recently I have been introducing and playing with double vowel sounds which were previously left out of her vocabulary list (bracketed words are already learned and/or spoken by Fig:

Below, AIUEO are the Japanese sounds Ah, Letter E, Ooh, Eh?, Oh!

(A), I, U, E, (O)
AA, II, UU, EE, OO  (AhAh, EeEe, OohOoh, EhEh?, OhOh, repectively)
AI, AU, AE, (AO)
IA, IU, IE, IO
UA, UI, UE, UO
EA, EI, EU, EO
(OA), OI, OE, OU

Not sure how things will pan out, but I am enjoying the connection, and the playtime with this unfortunate, but lucky Crow.  

International Bird-House of Pancakes

* Please note that I am NOT an expert, or even a trained amateur on the subject of how to properly feed and care for corvids. NOT!  If you know better PLEASE inform me. I have simply posted this informatioin here because it is what I am doing, and it is a learning process happening in less than ideal times. The Crow I am caring for likes these pancakes. She eats 3-4 per day, representing 6-8 tablespoons of food.  I cook only 4-5 days of food at a time to keep it fresh. Half in the freezer. Half in the fridge.

Other Foods: This diet is supplemented with fruits and berries, nuts, meats, fish, vegetables, pastas from wheat, buckwheat, other grains or beans, and tofu, and a very little bit of cheese, and chopped date or other dried fruit as a treat, and eggs shells aplenty, and gravel and sand grit for digestive purposes. To my credit though, Fig likes my cooking quite a lot.

Wild Foods: Also an assortment of wild foods, available seasonally, are collected for Fig and that list of items continues to grow.

Bad for Birds: Salt and sugar are not added, nor are spices.

Toxic Foods: As far as I know chocolate, onion, and garlic are off cat, dog, bird menues for toxicity reasons, so they are not represented here.

Milk: As far as milk is concerned, if Fig drinks raw milk, she will produce an all white pellet of the consistency of sour cream, or soft cream cheese, and her BM will contain a lot of calcium. I do not know if milk is bad for her, raw or uncooked, but I do not give her raw, uncooked milk, just to be safe. She seems to have no digestive issues with cooked milk, and a tiny bit of cheese from time to time, by which I mean a teaspoon once a week, or less often probably; she likes cheese but there is simply way too much salt in it. I figure the milk in the pancakes keeps her calcium, Vit D, and minerals up, and her digestion seems very healthy and normalized on cooked milk included here, below.

Changing the Recipe:
The recipe below is easily changed by using brown rice, or genmai (whole germ rice), instead of white, whole grain flour, or whole wheat flour, red garnet instead of satsuma sweet potatoes corn flour instead of flakes, chopped buckwheat or other pasta, and cooked lentils instead of tofu, use other grains like quinoa.  I use a variety of cooking oils, but use them very very sparingly, olive, corn, or canola are okay, again, I use them very sparingly just wiping the pan with an oily papertowel.

My Goals:
1. True Variety: I try and give Fig a variety of grains which include corn, wheat, rice, and whole protein beans. This way she is getting, or her body can manufacture complete protein. Mixing grains varieties is important to enable complete proteins to be made. Also, a variety of food sources ensures varied nutritional input. If one food is nutritionally weak, you avoid starving the bird of whatever that food lacks.

2. Flavor: To achieve a good flavor. Sweet potatoes are the only source of real sweetness or flavor in the pancakes, and Fig hates cooked carrot. She likes carrots raw though, probably because they are fun to peck and chew. If I don't think it is tasty myself, I won't give it to her.

3. Easy to Digest: To fully cook the 2 tablespoon pancakes well, but to end up with a high moisture food source. Fig can and will eat a tougher pancake, but I aim to give her something soft, and easy to digest since she cannot forage for a wide variety of natural digestive grit like wild Crows do. The pancakes are very moist, but I still usually soak them in water for a minute or too to additionally soften, and hydrate them to last in Fig's food bowl and remain soft for the time I am at work.

4. I aim to feed her one chicken egg per 2-4 days. Not sure how I came up with this figure; it is what it is.

5. I measure the amount of food she gets, eats and leaves. This is fairly consistent and precise. I use food cups to ensure Fig gets the same amount of food each day.

6. To weigh Fig regularly, to check her weight is consistent.

Recipe One:
2 Eggs
1 cup whole milk
4 Tblspns flour
2 Tblspns white rice cooked
2 Tblspns raw Oatmeal
2 Tblspns plain cornflakes (rinse well if sugared)
4 Tblspns Hard Tofu
3 Tblsphs cooked sweet potato
(You can add ground beef or other meats too)



Oh dear, the flapjacks have flipped.





16 to a jar = 4 day supply



Right Photo: 5 days worth of flappyjackdaws.

Left Photo: Before whisking well. 

Spring's Mysterious Silence

I noticed in March that Fig suddenly and completely stopped starting any conversations with me. I would bring her in as usual in the late afternoon, and she would sit in silence for hours unless I started talking to her first, in which case she quickly became her usual chatterbox self. I thought for a while that she had caught my cold, but she was not slumped or ruffled. So I surmised that she was simply content, and happily living the life of any ordinary human bird.

Then it dawned on me, the wild Crows around town were also awfully quite. What the heck? Ah ha! Of course, the Crows have all been working together in families, as they do, building nests! Most will have been incubating eggs for a number of weeks now. It's so obvious; they are simply keeping a low profile from any predators, or trespassing Crows looking to steal some tasty eggs, and very secretively going about building their nests, incubating the eggs, then protecting the chicks. It's spring. Duh! I am no natural ornithologist, this much is clear. Plus all that nest building must make them awfully busy, focused and tired out, running around locating and collecting sticks, and grocery shopping for the mother and several new siblings eager to grow up as soon as possible. Interesting. They must be so very, very excited.

One simply never notices these things until a wild Crow comes to live at your house. It remains something of a mystery though, why would a one year old juvenile like Fig go quite? Perhaps it is because her family lives right outside, flying about her each day. I wonder, did she know that they were up to making this year's nest? Her father has visited her on our balcony several times for a quick chat, and several other times for a longer chat from the safety of the TV antennae atop the adjacent building. So, was her hushed response to mating season innate, instinctual, the natural thing for female Crows to do, or did she get the low down from her Pops? I have no idea, and will probably never know, but the only Crows making noise these days are the young Juveniles playing in the afternoons, so one thing is very clear, most of the family is busy, busy, busy going back an forth with sticks, and pine needles, and more recently, beaks stuffed full of food for hungry wee chicks on the make.

Oh yes, we can expect a raucous load of fledglings circling the skies around here mid-May. Hopefully, none of them will end up at our house this year. A Crow that cannot fly is like a Whale slumped at the bottom of the ocean, looking up at all its friends swimming about, delighting in the ocean's heights above; a sad, sad thing indeed. 

Crow Education

Fig is studying 13 colors using cards, strings, foam shapes, and most recently this reward box I made with wood, and ice-cream sticks. Sometimes I give her two colors to choose from, sometimes a few, or several, sometimes all 13. If she cannot get it, I just remove colors one at a time, until she feels more confidence about answering. She answers by lifting off the tab with her beak.  I wish I had the time to work with her more because time with Fig is always full of humor, and play, and delight.

Her favorite reward so far is chopped dates. The amazing thing about studying with Fig is that she does not cheat. I completely expected that she would simply open all the boxes looking for the treat, but she doesn't.  Fig is very childlike in her relationship with me.  She knows that I am asking her to find the treat by telling her which color box to open.  She will not open boxes randomly searching for the reward.  She intuitively understands, right from the start, that I am placing an expectation on her, that it is a listening exercise, and that she has to try and find THE box which contains the reward, that she is supposed to earn it, by answering correctly. If she is uncertain, but thinks she knows the answer, she will lean towards the box she suspects, sort of pointing to it, looking to me for some extra assurance. She even tips her head when she is thinking about it, much as humans tend to do. And she is thrilled when she gets the answer right.

Fig is so similar to us humans in her moods, in her personality, in her interactions,  at times it makes me feel like I am actually talking to a Crow no differently than I might talk with a human child if we were to do the exact same activity. The only difference being that a human child might want an m&m or something other than a small bit of date.

Maze Puzzle for the Birds (Update 1 below)

I have no idea if anyone has ever tried this with a bird before, of any sort, but I decided to make a maze for Fig to see if she can learn to get a soybean or other rolly type of food through the maze. This first maze is very simple, but still requires quite a lot of deliberate action to complete. First, the food goes into the center via the hole. The maze is up on a ball glued in the center, on the bottom. By tipping the maze this way and that, the food can be made to roll to the square opening where Fig can take it out. Well, we'll see if she is able to pick this up or not. I suspect she'll get frustrated and want to peck the plexi-glass, so this will be a supervised activity when she is in a calm state of mind.

(Update 1) April 12: I tried this with several foods, but white bread rolled, or gently smooshed into a tight ball works very well. Fig has tried this once. She was full, and sleepy at the time, but that was intentional because I wanted to introduce this to her while she was calm. She sat on a familiar perch, and I put the ironing board in front, and just below her so she could easily see into the maze. Here's how it went: 1. I did the maze for her. I rolled the bread out. She ate it. Then she pecked the ironing board to tell me to hurry up and give her another ball of bread. 2. I did the maze again, using my finger in sort of a pecking gesture to move the ball around. After a lot of hesitation, deep looking into the opening, and much concern, Fig finally took the ball out of the box on her own, but she was incredibly suspicious about the whole thing. Again she pecked at the ironing board, 'Nother bread ball waiter!" 3. We took turns doing the maze. Fig had a couple of good pecks at the glass, and the wood edging; very hard to tell yet if she was attempting to intentionally roll the ball one way or the other. She refused to take the bread ball out on her own. I waited 15 minutes and even left the room a few times. She was just not going to put her beak in the gap again. Maybe because the ball was smaller, she did not feel it was worth the risk. Eventually, I rolled it out, and she snatched it up, pulled it apart, and gobbled it up. So that was it.  She was to full and too sleepy to take any interest in another go. Tomorrow she's on her own. Just need to balance the box a bit better with some coins which I will glue on the bottom.