My Spirit Animal is a Bird

I was born in the year of the tiger, but my spirit animal is definitely a bird. 

 I used to think that if I were a bird I'd be a Peregrine Falcon. They are one of my favorite birds, because they are very beautiful, fierce, epic hunters, and very smart. 

I once took a "what kind of bird are you?" quiz and I got Crow. 

Birds are very intelligent, even though there is that saying, "bird brain" they are actually the smartest animals in the world.

My second favorite bird next to the falcon is the Crow, though. 

They hold a special place in my heart. 

When my father was a boy in the 40's, he had a pet crow. 

One day while he was playing outside, a crow with one leg hopped over to him. 

He was able to catch it and pet it. 

He fed the crow everyday and soon the crow became his "pet". 

They had a really neat friendship that lasted several years. 

Real quick, some very interesting facts about Crows! 

• Crows have the biggest brain to body ratio among all bird species. Evolved with a highly developed forebrain, where intelligence is regulated, the anatomy of the crow brain is much similar to humans.

• Crows are very social and can even bond with humans. Commonly, it has been noticed that crows forage on the food disposed by humans. Moreover, they prove to be very useful when it comes to controlling pests that destroy crops.

• Crows are much smarter than birds, like owls, who often hunt them. Moreover, they also surpass the intelligence level of parrots.
  
• A test conducted in 2004 revealed that crows are cleverer than Bonobo chimpanzees. This fact made them the most intelligent creatures after humans, and hence, scientists named them as ‘feathered apes’.
  
• Crows have a very complex form of language and their distinctive ‘cawing’ has different meanings at different times. They have also been known to mimic sounds of other animals and can associate different commotions to different events.
  
• Crows have such high level of intelligence that it has been observed that if a crow is unable to crack a nut, then it puts it on a highway so that vehicle could pass over it to crack it open. 
  ( We used to watch the crows do this in California, with the walnuts they'd collect from our orchard,)
• Crows have single mate in their entire life and after hatching the eggs, both male and female take turn to incubate them.
  
• Crows can skilfully construct the tools for food! Well, this fact has put up the scientific world in intrigue. Making tools was only known to be performed among humans and apes, like, chimpanzees. This new finding has bewildered the scientific community.
  
• The New Caledion crow can develop knife like tools from stiff leaves and stiff stalk of grasses.
  
• Just like parrots, crows can also imitate human voice.
  
• Crows have the ability to judge the character of human beings by reading their faces and expressions

What do you think? 

Crows are absolutely amazing, right?! 

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I feel very blessed to live in a place where we get all kinds of birds who like to drop in for a visit and who like to live in the garden among us here at the Little Hermitage -the Towhee, Robins, and Sparrows <3 And our favorite residents, the Hermit Thrush (our top favorite, because of its unique call) & the sweetest Mourning Dove couple<33

Here are just a few of the visitors I've snapped pics of; 

Hummingbird

Pleated Woodpecker

Black-Backed Woodpecker

Northern Flicker Woodpecker

Sparrow

And Bald Eagles

These adorable little guys/gals let me know when they are out of water. They fly around me and then fly back and forth to the bath and trees near the bath, then back to me.

Such clever little birds!

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