So here’s my interpretation as someone who studied this. These are all young birds, as is the dead one based on the tail length. I would often see young birds especially curious about the dead specimens, touching them, alarm calling, or remaining silent.
It wasn’t until their parents came in and alarm called that many of them would start to alarm themselves or leave. Their behaviors did not differ towards dead crows, dead pigeons, or dead squirrels. It all looked like this.
So are these birds trying to wake this one up? I doubt it. I think they are just exploring an unresponsive bird and learning.
Towards the end of the video you can see one get a little more ambitious with its pecks, even removing some feathers. This is curious since it’s not territorial.
Although cannibalism is rare among corvids, most first hand reports I’ve received abt it are observations of juvies doing it. Not asserting that’s what’s happening. Just offering among the possibilities.
More likely is that it’s just further testing the waters of unresponsiveness.
