Damn, and here i thought for the first time since my degree, i might be able to answersomething related to native american langagues. frick. ;-)

I was up Mount Tam last year when I noticed the crows were playing in the air. They started by playing a sort of game of catch, and then one picked a twig off a redwood and they played using that. I had never seen wild animals playing with a tool before. One would fly with it in its claws, and the other would chase the first and try to grab it. There was a lot of CHEATING (ha ha, just as you get near I grab it from my claws with my beak and dart away) and LAUGHTER (ha ha, now it's back in my feet again and I'm cawing at you gleefully). It was mind blowing to me. I had no idea birds had such a rich repertoire of communicative ludic behaviour. They played for a couple of hours.

I heard that crows and ravens can imitate human speech like parrots and make good pets if you raise them.

There's a really good book just out called In the Company of Crows and Ravens that probably addresses their calls, but I haven't read it yet.