Living in the city comes with its own perks and problems. For crows in the cities like New York, there are cheeseburgers to eat but there is also high cholesterol.
As we know, crows are pretty much down to anything when it comes to eating. They eat everything humans eat and most of what they eat, we may not even consider as food. Crows eat plants, grains, insects, carrion, animal dung and often go diving in garbage dumpsters and landfills.
Crows are eating 3 cheeseburgers a day!
In Clinton, New York, crows have been feasting on McDonald cheeseburgers – sometimes as much as three cheeseburgers a day, while many have been found to be taking the burgers home for their babies, others storing the burgers for munching later on.
This whole exercise is part of an experiment by a team from Hamilton College, New York – led by Assistant Professor Andrea Townsend. Aim of the experiment is to check the effect of fast food on crows living in cities and how it affects their cholesterol level and survival rates.
Mr. Crowley, how high is your cholesterol?
Research has revealed that urban crows have higher levels of cholesterol because of eating leftovers by humans. After eating cheeseburgers, their cholesterol has become even higher. High levels of cholesterol has also been found in animals who live nearby humans – such as foxes, sparrows, rock iguanas, and even sea turtles from the densely populated areas of Canary Islands.
How dangerous it is for the crows?
In small doses, cholesterol is a good thing. It’s essential to body function and is a part of cells’ structure, acting as a precursor for hormones and a component of bile, which breaks down fat. It’s in excess that it’s associated with disease. – Andrea Townsend
Andrea Townsend found in her research that increased cholesterol levels in the crows do not affect their survival rates. Low survival rates among urban crows is because of car collisions, disease and predators.
On the other hand, a diet of fast food led to a better body condition for the urban crows. Which just means that the urban crows are chubbier as compared to their rural cousins.
Should we feed junk food to birds now?
She also adds that the effects of high cholesterol is reflected later in the human lives, so it may be possible that we will see some adverse effects in crows later on:
Crows can live more than 15 years in the wild, might develop disease later in life, but this needs further research.
Since we are not aware of how cholesterol can affect crows, it’s probably not a good idea to feed them junk food.
Feed them grains, fruits, vegetables, meat et cetera
“If you feed backyard crows, giving them something as natural as you can get is the preferable thing.” adds Townsend.
Featured Image Courtesy: Andrea Townsend
Journal reference: https://academic.oup.com/condor/article/121/3/duz040/5536814
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