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https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/feb/01/swedish-crows-pick-up-cigarette-butts-litter>
"Crows are being recruited to pick up discarded cigarette butts from the
streets and squares of a Swedish city as part of a cost-cutting drive.
The wild birds carry out the task as they receive a little food for every butt
that they deposit in a bespoke machine designed by a startup in Södertälje,
near Stockholm.
“They are wild birds taking part on a voluntary basis,” said Christian
Günther-Hanssen, the founder of Corvid Cleaning, the company behind the method.
The Keep Sweden Tidy Foundation says that more than 1bn cigarette butts are
left on Sweden’s streets each year, representing 62% of all litter. Södertälje
spends 20m Swedish kronor (£1.6m) on street cleaning.
Günther-Hanssen estimates his method could save at least 75% of costs involved
with picking up cigarette butts in the city.
Södertälje is carrying out a pilot project before potentially rolling out the
operation across the city, with the health of the birds being the key
consideration given the type of waste involved.
New Caledonian crows, a member of the corvid family of birds, are as good at
reasoning as a human seven-year-old, research has suggested, making them the
smartest birds for the job."
Via Doug Senko, who wrote "It’s impossible to train humans. Lol"
Share and enjoy,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
