The Genius of Birds

by Jennifer Ackerman

THE CROW stares back at me, intense, quizzical, as if asking what is so surprising. I wonder if the brain inside that black skullcap is any different from the brain of other corvids. Research suggests that there may be small differences. One study shows that the New Caledonian crow’s brain is bigger, at least compared with the brains of carrion crows and European magpies and jays. (However, as we know, overall brain size can be a rudimentary measure.) There is some ballooning in areas of the forebrain thought to be involved in fine motor control and in associative learning. This may improve the crow’s dexterity and boost its ability to pay attention to what it’s doing—a big advantage in any mental challenge. Moreover, as Russell Gray points out, New Caledonian crow brains have slightly higher numbers of glial cells, which in humans are thought to be involved in the mechanism of learning and memory known as synaptic plasticity. In sum, the brains of these crows may possess “no miraculous extra new structure,” observes Gray, “just small, incremental tweaks.”