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by autoexec 589 days ago
Animals have to get their enjoyment where they can. It's always fun to watch them play. You can start to think that animals are always optimizing the time they spend being active and are carefully preserving their energy in order to survive, but then you see some birds going sledding (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hn0OjCneVUg) and it's clear that they're just in it for the fun.
2 comments
Jarmsy 589 days ago
This summer I spent an hour watching a pair of magpies harass a fox. The fox was trying to sunbathe, but the magpies kept dive-bombing it, pecking its tail, and landing in front of it then flying away just as the fox went for them, all while making a chattering sound that seemed a lot like laughter. I've heard theories that they do this as revenge for stolen eggs, or to chase foxes away from their nests, but this was in an open patch of ground far from where they nest and it really looked to me that they were just teasing it for fun.
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bayindirh 589 days ago
They may know that particular fox.

Crows can identify singular persons, hold grudge against them and disseminate the information around to make sure that particular person has a hard time [0].

Magpies are also very smart birds, aggressively protecting their nests and offspring from cats and other threats. So they may have identified that fox somewhere else.

Also, IIRC, magpies and crows are somewhat related.

[0]: https://urban.uw.edu/news/crows-hold-grudges-against-individ...

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vidarh 589 days ago
> Also, IIRC, magpies and crows are somewhat related.

They are both corvids (members of the family Corvidae) along with ravens, rooks, jackdaws, jays and others. Most corvids are fairly smart.

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rolandog 589 days ago
In my hometown, sometimes birds (I think they may have been crows) swoop across real close to cars along a straight stretch of highway. I've had to slow down sometimes thinking I might hit one.

I like to imagine they go back to their group of bird bros and say: "Ha! Made him flinch!".

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Jarmsy 589 days ago
One of favourite examples of this sort of thrill seeking animal behaviour is this gibbon pulling the ears of a young tiger https://youtu.be/SHXo-BpE8T8
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rolandog 588 days ago
That is fascinating! The laps he runs around the young tigers! Thanks for the link.
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jl6 589 days ago
That's a cool video but I'm not 100% convinced that crow is "having fun". It looks equally plausible that the crow is trying to break open the object, possibly in search of food.
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