Talk:Corvidae

Untitled
I'm new (and also terribly vain), so I feel it only right to ask permission to create a page Corvine to redirect here. Is it unnecessary? I feel like I'm breaking the vanity page rules, even though it's just the meaning of my handle and no reflection on me. Feline redirects to Felidae, after all. Corvine 19:08, 6 Mar 2005 (UTC)


 * You don't need anyone's permission, although corvine doesn't appear in my Chambers dictionary ... jimfbleak 06:28, 7 Mar 2005 (UTC)


 * Corvine sounds like a word in the vein of lupine, canine, vulpine, and feline (wolf-like, dog-like, fox-like, and cat-like, respectively). Might not be in a dictionary, but so long as you know what sort of animal corvidae is, I think corvine would be apt to describe something that exhibits traits of crows/magpies/jays/etc. Jade Peat 04:20, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Κορακοειδή
Corvidae is κορακοειδή in Greek. Please build that page also! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2.84.202.238 (talk) 05:05, 31 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Having the name in Greek makes sense only if there is a Greek etymology of the term; there isn't. Wikipedia is not a foreign language dictionary. --Omnipaedista (talk) 08:36, 11 April 2014 (UTC)

Human Language Mimicry
I have read in a book, now forgotten, that raven's (though possibly all corvids, i don't know) can mimic human language like parrots. I would add this to the section discussing their intelligence but I can't find the book now, and thus I can't cite it. Does anyone know about this? --AdamFJohnson 19:52, 20 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Oops, the common raven page has a section on vocalization. I suppose I should have checked that first.  Would that be appropriate to add?--AdamFJohnson 19:55, 20 April 2007 (UTC)

Crows and ravens
I have experienced a crow speaking before. As a teenager, I knew a woman in Deepwater, Missouri, USA who had a crow (or raven) which could speak english much like a parrot. She told me that crows could talk if their tounges were split. This crow was able to speak phrases and sentances as well as wolf whistle. This crow did seem to understand some questions asked of it, whether this was repetitive response or actual understanding I couldn't tell you.


 * Unfortunately, Wikipedia does not accept anecdotal evidence. If you could find a citable source verifying this it would have a place in the article.

Iron filings (talk) 10:48, 4 July 2021 (UTC)

Recently
Recently the Corvus genus has re-entered Australia, resulting in five new species and one new subspecies - how recently? A week last Tuesday? Seems oddly colloquial. If recent has a specific meaning in Zoology that I'm not aware of, then my apologies. Otherwise, d'you think this would perhaps be better expressed as, In relatively recent evolutionary history ... or even better, Within the last XY,000 years ...? 194.80.54.155 11:45, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Not Cited Correctly
on a brain-to-body ratio, the corvid brain equals the size of a chimpanzee, is roughly the same as a dolphin, and is only slightly lower than a human [16]. I'm new here too so I took me a couple of tries to get my input in. I can't find any consistent or credible record of the brain to body weight ratio for Crows or any other Corvids. The statement is false in any case (expected for body size-chimp:3.5, man:7 )I've looked and found the ratio for Bottle Nose Dolphins to be 4.32, according to Lori Marino("Cetacean Brain Evolution: Multiplication Generates Complexity")User:Rooktje 04:41, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
 * The statement (and its cited source) are ambiguous as to whether the measure is brain-to-body mass or brain-to-body volume. If the former, then it may be true since birds who fly have bodies with a low mass-to-volume ratio by necessity.

Help identifying a bird
I'm currently on the Pacific coast of Oaxaca state, Mexico. The most common bird here looks like a relative of the crow but I've been unable to find out what it's called in English or Spanish. A local informant has told me they're called urraca but that means magpie and it doesn't match the pictures of anything I can find on the web under those terms.

The birds are quite smaller than crows and seem to mimic a wide range of other bird calls but have no sound like any crow I've heard. They are black with the males being very glossy which appears blue in the right sunlight. The females are dull and appear brown to almost yellow. They have a fascinating personality. Unfortunately I don't have access to a digital camera to attach a photo. Can you help me identify this bird? (crossposted to Talk:List of birds of Mexico) &mdash; Hippietrail 16:15, 18 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Great-tailed or Boat-tailed Grackle jimfbleak 05:54, 19 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Yes they seem to be Great-tailed Grackles, thanks for your help! &mdash; Hippietrail 20:26, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Gondwanan origin of Corvids
My understanding is that recent genetic work:

http://www.journals.royalsoc.ac.uk/content/576rvcglhrkrtejq/

http://www.journals.royalsoc.ac.uk/content/ahy65flpxtl5tu03/

http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.0908-8857.2001.03409.x

has suggested that the Corvids are of Gondwanan origin and actually spread from Australia to the northern hemisphere. I think the use of 'recently' and its lack of citations should be re-examined.

To do list
I've decided to try and take this one to FA as an important family. It has already had quite a bit of work done to it so I'm laying out what I plan to do; this way people who have been working here before should be able to add what they think is needed.
 * Standardise some of the headings (description instead of appearance)
 * add missing sections; distribution in particular, but also economic importance in human section
 * expand where needed (feeding and breeding in particular)
 * expand POV to include more on treepies, ground-jays, nutcrackers, choughs and others; kind of crow and raven heavy at the moment in places.
 * reorganise sections on general behaviour
 * consolidate, organise and fully cite intelligence
 * hunt down more images of corvids behaving for article and ask someone to make a map of worldwide distribution.

Did I miss anything? Sabine's Sunbird  talk  04:20, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Range Map
What keeps Corvids mysteriously from south-west South America — neither colder nor drier than other parts of their range... and it's hard to imagine these curiousity-filled birds leaving any place uninvestigated. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.202.197.92 (talk) 02:51, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

Are they the most intelligent?
I'm skeptical of this line: "They are considered the most intelligent of the birds..." While the recent test of awareness of magpies was impressive, it does not mean that corvids are the most intelligent of birds. It just means that they are the most intelligent birds studied so far and by the standards of the mirror test.

For comparison, the Bowerbird page says they are the "most advanced of any species of bird."

Can this statement about corvid intelligence be qualified a little bit? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Spchampion (talk • contribs) 21:16, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Biology: Ecology section
"One reason for the success of crows, compared to ravens..."
 * This second paragraph pertains to comparisons between breeding territories of two corvid species (American crows and common ravens) in a specific geographic location (the western US) and hence does not contribute to the understanding of corvid ecology as a whole. I'd suggest, if possible, reworking this information to emphasize its applicability to corvids in general, or moving it to the general article on crows or the specific article on the American crow. Comments? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Avagad2 (talk • contribs) 18:52, 13 February 2011 (UTC)

Relative intelligence
I had always heard that gray parrots were the most intelligent birds, with the crow family second. If parrot intelligence is mostly evident in their verbalization (which turns out to be, on some level, true language, not just "parroting")... and if, by contrast, corvid intelligence is more evident in tool use... then it might be hard to compare directly. Well, I don't pretend to know much about this, but it seems to me that just stating as a bald fact in the article that corvids are the most intelligent birds is rather questionable. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.243.102.251 (talk) 15:43, 18 September 2012 (UTC)