I’m off to film rooks for a week in Strasbourg – for a film about bird cognition – I expect that they will confirm that the average corvid is smarter than the average cameraman. Apparently they do all sorts of fantastic behaviours that suggest that there is a whole lot more going on in the minds of the more intelligent bird species than we had previously given them credit for.
I have been asked to send a photograph of my face to the researcher in advance so the birds can get used to me (“they are not shy, just annoying”) – this is a first for me. Last night I dreamt that I arrived at the aviary to find that the birds had packed out the eyes from the photograph … what can it all mean?