Frans de Waal in PLoS Biology:
The Eurasian magpie (Pica pica) has a poor reputation. As a child, I learned never to leave small shiny objects, such as teaspoons, unattended outdoors as these raucous birds will steal anything they can put their beaks on. This folklore even inspired a Rossini opera, “La gazza ladra” (“The Thieving Magpie”). Nowadays, this view has been replaced with one that is more sensitive to ecological balance, in which magpies are depicted as murderous plunderers of the nests of innocent songbirds. Either way, they are black-and-white gangsters.
But no one has ever accused a magpie of being stupid. The bird belongs to the Corvidae, a worldwide family (also including crows, ravens, jackdaws, jays, and nutcrackers) marked by an exceptionally large forebrain, which permits innovative foraging. In recent years, this family has begun to pose a challenge to the idea that primates constitute the pinnacle of cognitive evolution by showing creative tool-use, visual perspective-taking, foresight, and so on.
My entertainment last night was watching the videos and cooing over how them. I love magpies.