
%0 Journal Article
%A Hunt, Gavin R. 
%T Tool Use by the New Caledonian Crow <emph type="2">Corvus moneduloides</emph> to Obtain Cerambycidae from Dead Wood
%J Emu
%D 2000/06/01
%V 100
%N 2
%P 109-114
%K 
%R https://doi.org/10.1071/MU9852
%U https://www.publish.csiro.au/paper/MU9852 
%X From a successful effort in late 1997 to film crow tool-use with the BBC Natural History Unit, I present the first detailed description of New Caledonian CrowsCorvus moneduloides using tools to extract larvae of an endemic Cerambycidae:Prioninae from dead wood. I observed birds over a six-week period at Sarram&#233; where fallen Aleurites moluccana logs were &#8216;salted&#8217; with the larvae. Crows habitually used mostly A. moluccana leaf-stems to extract larvae from holes and manufacture was also common when birds removed leaves from leaf-stems before using tools. The techniques of adult crows varied but were more proficient than those of a juvenile crow that frequented the site. Tool-use to extract Cerambycidae from dead wood was probably an important part of the foraging behaviour of the crows year-round. My observations here and elsewhere show that crows in different localities can have distinctly different traditions in their tool behaviour. 
