A recent study from the University of Auckland, New Zealand, and the University of Cambridge determined that the New Caledonian crow is as smart as the average 5 to 7-year-old child.
The researchers were inspired by the Aesop fable in which a crow figures out how to get a drink of water from a half-filled pitcher it can't get its beak into.
As you know, the crow in the tale accomplished his goal by dropping stones in the vessel until the water level was high enough to be accessible.
What you may not know, is that real-life crows have the smarts to perform that trick as well.
In the study, six crows were presented with a similar challenge, only their water glasses had a worm floating in them.
They were supplied with a variety of objects that would either float or sink once they were thrown in.
Sure enough, they picked the heavy ones that would displace the water and retrieved their rewards.
The scientists say the reasoning skills the clever crows displayed were equivalent to ones utilized by a group of children they'd tested earlier.
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