A lesson from the crow

Ramta

Member
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Remember that well-loved Aesop's fable of the crow and the pitcher? A very thirsty crow (Corvus splendens) finds a clay pitcher with a little water at the bottom. It tries every trick it knows to get to the water and fails.

And then the great idea dawns. It picks up one pebble after another and drops them into the pitcher, till the water rises to the top. A great ornithologist once describes this much-reviled bird as ``audacious, cunning and uncannily wary.''

R.K.Laxman, our very own cartoonist, has drawn hundreds of crows and even held exhibitions. ``Crows are such clever creatures. Just watch them for a while and you'll learn so many new lesssons.''

Indeed, on Monday morning, I did learn a dozen lessons.

7.50 am at the poolside of my neighbourhood Municipal Park. Ambling along the road that skirts the pool I spotted a crow struggling with a multi-pronged twig in its beak on the lawn besides the old building.

``Poor bird. Let me help,'' was the instinctive response.

But wait. Wasn't this the nesting season?

Indeed. There, 30 feet high in the uppermost branch of a neem tree, Mrs. Crow was busy arranging the twigs for her new nest.

Down below, Mr. Crow looked up at the adjacent fig tree and flew three feet to the lowest branch. Then holding the twig, he pecked at the smaller pieces, cutting them and spitting them out.

One more upward trajectory to seven feet and more pecking, more pruning.

A third flight up to 12 feet and a renewed burst of pecking.

At this juncture, its foot slipped, but like a high-wire artiste, he regained his footing, looked heavenward and flew at 60 degrees from fig to neem tree.

Alas, he was still five feet short of the nest. The weight of the twig and the dense branches made it impossible for him to fly the distance.

Craning my neck I wished the poor bird good luck.

Suddenly, it looked at terra firma, at the roof of the Nearby building and flew the 40 feet in one swoop.

Then it looked up at the nest, at Mrs. Crow and in one fluid motion flew straight like a bullet to the nest.

A raucuous cawing later, Mr. Crow was back looking for more twigs.

In a couple of days, Mrs. Crow will lay 4 or 5 pale blue-green, speckled eggs streaked with brown. And before they hatch the more cunning Koel found in plenty in the Park might destroy an egg or two and lay similar coloured eggs and let Mrs. Crow play foster mother.

So what's the moral of this tale?

That even a humble crow uses so much intelligence to build its nest.

Perhaps our engineers at the Municipalities, PWDs, Power and Telephones companies should spend time in Parks studying our feathered friends. For the birds seem to know more about engineering and aesthetics than our whole lazy caboodle.

Thanks

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