Ravens can plan for future as well as 4-year-old children can

Ravens can plan for future events at least as well as 4-year-old humans and some adult, non-human great apes. The birds did this in tasks they wouldn't encounter in the wild, so it isn't an adaptation to an ecological niche, but rather a flexible cognitive ability that evolved independently in birds and hominids, whose lineages diverged about 320 million years ago. Planning for future events requires the use of long-term memory for some anticipated future gain. For a long time, it was thought to be a uniquely human trait. Children begin showing such abilities when they are about 4. But it turned out that chimpanzees, bonobos and orangutans have this ability too, making tools to use later on.