Meet family pet – Walter the crow

Meet Walter the crow, adopted feathered member of the Renaud family of Ottawa, ON. He entered their lives when mother Elissa discovered the little baby bird lying injured in the grass near a bike path last spring, and brought it home to nurse it back to health, reports the CBC.

She wasn’t sure how the bird would fare in their family of four seeing that they already had two cats and a couple of fish, but she felt sorry for the small animal and the decision was made to bring the little bird home with the plan that, once recovered, it would eventually return to the wild.

But since his recovery and release from care, Walter – now ‘free as a bird’ – has chosen to stick around the Renaud family home, often flying through open doors or windows to perch near family members, enjoy snacks set out for him, cuddle and watch TV, and even escort the kids to school – just like other family pets.

“As I walked the kids to school, he trotted along behind us and I realized, yeah. … He thinks he’s part of us and he’s going to walk the kids to school and take care of them and be part of the gang. I realized that he was going to stay," mom Elissa told the CBC.

The kids love their pet bird, and in a video of Walter perched on the handlebars of her bike, young Livia Renaud said, “He’s certainly my best friend in the animal kingdom….We go on bike rides around, and we talk together, and sometimes if I’m feeling sad I’ll tell him because I know he won’t tell anyone else. Or secrets my friends have told me, and I really need to get them out, I’ll just tell him because I know he won’t talk.”

Dad, Patrik, is a teacher, and believes that one day Walter will leave the adopted nest once he matures and takes flight to start a family of his own – a similar path his adopted human siblings will take one day. Until then, the family is enjoying their time with Walter.

Crows are one of the most intelligent species in the animal kingdom, with a brain proportion similar to that of chimpanzees. Researchers have found crows can recognize different human faces and will sound warnings to other birds if they believe the human is ‘bad,’ for example, a researcher who trapped crows for tagging. Though humans cannot generally tell individual crows apart, crows have the ability to visually recognize individual humans, and to transmit information about ‘bad’ humans by squawking.

Scientists are only just beginning to understand what these birds are capable of, and one researcher, Joshua Klein, suggests crows could be trained to pick up waste using a vending machine designed to give a food reward in exchange for the trash. He presented his research at a Technology Education and Design (TED) talk that provides fascinating information about crows and their intelligence.

So the next time you’re watching Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds, the crows lined up on the playground equipment might not seem all that far off the mark, especially if the victim had previously worked as a bird researcher. When you hear a murder of crows making a lot of noise as you walk by, they might just be trying to tell you something.