Linus the white necked raven is learning a new behavior through a process of positive reinforcement called shaping. He gets his favorite bits of food as he places the block in the mark from further and further away. Critical rule of thumb in training birds smarter than you: don’t bore the raven and don’t push the session too long. Slooooooow walk home 😆 | Avian Behavior Conservancy

Forrest the white necked raven had a big week. He worked in FOUR school and church programs, evoking laughs from kids and adults with his chaotic ways. As a cherry on top, he veered off of his usual on site repertoire of painting pictures, recycling, stuffing the donation box full of dollars, and color discrimination for his favorite came of fetch with @eaglefalconer and @simonebird7 Years ago Forrest surprised me by making up fetch on his own. The reason that is so special is because despite po

Corvids are smarty-pants animals, and Forrest the white necked raven has always been one of the smartest birds I know. This was an early video from 2016 when he first learned to place items on a target, and we taught him to generalize this anything we cued him. Even more cumbersome items, like hand towels 😆 Ravens are the only non-primate animals that use gestures. They use their beaks to point to items. These are called deictic gestures. Even observations of comparable gestures in primates are