Do not turn your back on the crows

Crows have been in the news lately. A Washington Post article about Tokyo vs. the crows has been syndicated all over the place. It seems to me the lede was buried in favor of some alliteration. That crows are eating trash - even "garbage in Ginza" - is less surprising and interesting than that they are, in the third paragraph, eating the infrastructure of the fastest internet in the world. And the actual infrastructure, too - they've caused blackouts and stopped a bullet train?! Why not have your cake and eat it too: "shutting down shinkansens" or "feeding on fiber optics?"

Then from NPR, we find out that crows are crafty - vengeful and vindictive (wow, that is easy to fall into). The 8-minute audio portion has a story about how good they are at telling people apart and at holding a grudge forever. There's a photo test to see how good you are at telling crows apart. Those look like normal American crows, though. Listening to the story while picturing Japan's jungle crows, with beaks the size of of hearty lobster claws, makes it all the more chilling. (The character for "jungle crow," 嘴太鴉, which I don't think is actually used much, means "thick beak crow.")

Predatory crows seem to be a problem at Tokyo University, too. These signs I snapped there warn that there have been "many recent occurrences" of them sneaking up from behind on hapless students.

Among the list of warnings: As much as possible, do not take your eye off the crows.