Here’s something to crow about: A historical theme park in
France has enlisted the brainy birds to clean up after pigs.
The folks at Puy du Fou in the western Vendée region have schooled six “intelligent” rooks to collect cigarette butts and debris left on their grounds.
The gregarious Eurasian
Crows deposit the detritus into a small box. But these waste collectors don’t work for free. Each time they deliver a piece of trash, the box dispenses a tasty treat.
“The goal is not just to clear up, because the visitors are generally careful to keep things clean,” the park’s president, Nicolas de Villiers, told Agence France-Presse news agency, noting that the birds also “like to communicate with humans and establish a relationship through play.”
The first cleaners have already been put to work, with the rest set to join them on Monday.
Puy du Fou attracts more than 2 million visitors a year, making it the second most popular theme park in France after Disneyland Paris.
When it comes to crows, however, this is not the first feather in the birds’ cap. Earlier this year, scientists created a vending machine that showed the crows’ prowess solving problems. The machine required a particular size of paper token to release a treat.