New Caledonian crows can fashion hooks out of wire to grab titbits
© GettyNew Caledonian crows can fashion hooks out of wire to grab titbits
Man always likes to think he's a cut above the rest of the natural world.

And one of the ways he likes to set himself apart is by his use of tools. Now, on that yardstick I'm barely human.

I am to DIY what the New York Yankees are to football. But the rest of humankind is far from alone in being a dab hand with tools.

This week an endangered crow from sun-soaked Hawaii became the latest species to be proclaimed a tool-user. Nature magazine said the Alala was observed by St Andrews University researchers winkling tasty grubs out of dead wood with a twig held in its beak.

It is following in the footsteps of New Caledonian crows, which can fashion hooks out of wire to grab titbits.

A fascinating new book by ecologist Carl Safina says tool use is widespread. Birds do it, elephants do it, even educated gorillas do it.

Chimps use sticks to get termites and stones to smash nuts
© GettyChimps use sticks to get termites and stones to smash nuts
As for insects - try stopping them.

Rooks presented with a plastic tube with food that could only be released by dropping a stone down it had no trouble working out what to do.

When they were given a stick, they stuffed it down the tube straight away. Given sticks of different lengths or widths, they chose the one that would work... and so on.

Our closest relatives also show a flair for basic technology.

Chimps use sticks to get termites and stones to smash nuts while macaques with a taste for the finer things in life use rocks to smash open oysters.

Gorillas have been seen testing water depth with sticks and using logs to make bridges over swamps.

Elephants use sticks to scratch their backs but will also flatten electric fences with rocks or logs.

Green herons are nature's anglers - throwing insects or bread on to the water as fish bait. Then there's the ugly bugs' ball. Ants that find liquid food will go and get a leaf and scoop up the juice and carry it back to the nest.

Other ants lure ground nesting bees into the open with a co-ordinated attack. One ant will go to the rim of the bee's nest and drop soil down it. When the angry bee emerges the ant's mates kill him. Now that takes quite a bit of planning.

So next time you crush an ant, just remember - you may be killing a military genius. Beyond Words - What Animals Think And Feel by Carl Safina, Souvenir Press, £20.