Uek has a problem. She can see a piece of food through a hole in a plastic box, but she cannot reach it. Fortunately, Uek is a New Caledonian crow, a bird that is both intelligent and adept with tools. She grabs a stick with her bill, pushes it forward through the hole and knocks the morsel onto a slope,. It rolls within her reach, and she tucks in.
Kermit has an even bigger problem. He’s faced with the same out-of-reach snack. He has the same stick and the same smarts. But Kermit is a kea, a green parrot with a sharp, curved beak. He can’t wield a stick with the same precision as Uek with her short, straight beak. So Kermit improvises. He picks the stick sideways in his beak and pushes one end through the hole. He holds it there with his foot, grabs the other end in his beak, and finally (and awkwardly) pushes it at the food. Eventually, he too gets a meal.
Uek and Kermit are members of arguably the most intelligent groups of birds – the parrots and the corvids (the family that includes crows, ravens, jays and magpies). For their size, their brains are roughly as big as those of great apes, and their behaviour can be just as sophisticated. They’ve shown many advanced skills including planning for the future, using tools and solving problems.
