In the interview the founder says that the next step would be to investigate how the health of the crows is impacted from picking cigarette butts. Such negative effect should then be weighed against any positive health effect that could be achieved by adding extra nutrients to the "reward food". Malnutrition can be a problem for crows eating too much junk food (from garbage).
Generally, animals don't eat things that aren't food. They have taste buds and olfactory senses, just like us, and eat things that taste and smell evolutionarily "good". For me, cigarettes smell bad and taste terrible (I tasted one when I was about 7), and I doubt it's much different for birds that are omnivores. I suppose one possible path to them actually eating cigarettes would be if some was accidentally ingested, then they became addicted.
More likely, crows could game it by breaking up litter into smaller pieces to get more credit for the same work, or going after easier pickings that don't count as litter and don't need to be removed (rocks, twigs).
Example of dolphins doing the first trick:
>> Kelly [the dolphin] has taken this task one step further. When people drop paper into the water she hides it under a rock at the bottom of the pool. The next time a trainer passes, she goes down to the rock and tears off a piece of paper to give to the trainer. After a fish reward, she goes back down, tears off another piece of paper, gets another fish, and so on.
Sweden recently made it illegal to throw small pieces of litter like cigs on the ground. Of course hard to enforce but now police can actually act if they see it happen and perhaps make examples of some people.
800 SEK fine for cigs, chewing gum, snus for example.
I used to smoke but I always just stayed around a bin, or made sure I had one near me when I was done. It's really not hard. I'd like to see double that fine.
> I used to smoke but I always just stayed around a bin, or made sure I had one near me when I was done. It's really not hard. I'd like to see double that fine.
The problem with that is that bins are usually where people spend a lot of time. For example bus stops or benches in a park. If you have asthma it sucks to wait for a bus when someone smokes near it.
> Sweden recently made it illegal to throw small pieces of litter like cigs on the ground.
Is that true? Then I'm surprised littering wasn't illegal before. (Or this this a case of "oh no, people are doing [something illegal]! let's make it illegal!"?)
I keep a small pouch in my bag that is designed to store cig butts. Useful for when there are no bins around. It’s sealed so there is no smell and I can empty it into a bin later.
To be fair those estimates to pick up one butt are not very fair, since they are not giving any welfare benefits like social insurance to crows, no maternity leave etc.
If crows unionize and start demanding maternity leave and other benefits they should be entitled to I could see how they would become more expensive than humans considering their reproduction rate. So in the end this seems more like exploiting workers unaware of their legal rights.
And let's ignore the fact they mention only crows as if magpies were not allowed to participate or are they overqualified for this position?
If any crow reads this contact me at 1-800-CROWHELP to help you claim all the benefits.
This would be absolutely fantastic, especially because crows are social animals and learn from each-other's behavior (so your trained contingent would expand over time)! That said there is a small risk - if crows learn to do this second hand and don't necessarily put the buds in the box, they could start fires by dropping still lit buds that were left on concrete in the wrong, combustible, place - dry grass, paper garbage, etc.
I found the costs interesting: "The estimation for the cost of picking up cigarette butts today is around 80 öre or more per cigarette butt, some say 2 kronor." A Krona is about a US dime, so that's saying it's somewhere between 8 and 20 cents currently per butt. Call it ten cents. Then you'd need to collect a hundred butts to make ten dollars. The majority of humans on Earth would jump at that chance (assuming sufficient density of butts).
Maybe some deposit scheme would work. Two euros per package of cigarettes, get them back if you return your 20 cigarette butts.
Bit disgusting, but I really despise all the cigarette butts even at the wildest locations.
If that cost is the cost of an employer then the cost is at least twice the pay the person doing the work would get. E.g. to run an operation where someone is paid $10/h your cost is likely $20/h including insurance/clothes/transport and other overheads for the employer (Payroll taxes alone are usually around 50% on top of the hourly pay). So if the cost is a dime then a cigarette butt picker might make 5c which isn't as great. It's 200 butts/h for minimum wages.
There is no legally defined minimum wage in Scandinavia. There are agreements between unions and employer organizations for the pay for classes of work. At least that's how it works here (Norway).
You'd need to house, feed etc the workers at first-world standards (or pay them enough) which makes up the current costs. Anything else is basically slave labor.
Readit News
The founder says:
* It takes a little over a month to train a crow to pick cigarette butts
* It takes one month to train a crow not to be afraid of the big box
(in total 2 1/2 months)
* Other crows will learn from the first crows that have been trained
See the Cobra effect: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perverse_incentive
Example of dolphins doing the first trick:
>> Kelly [the dolphin] has taken this task one step further. When people drop paper into the water she hides it under a rock at the bottom of the pool. The next time a trainer passes, she goes down to the rock and tears off a piece of paper to give to the trainer. After a fish reward, she goes back down, tears off another piece of paper, gets another fish, and so on.
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2003/jul/03/research.sci...
Deleted Comment
800 SEK fine for cigs, chewing gum, snus for example.
I used to smoke but I always just stayed around a bin, or made sure I had one near me when I was done. It's really not hard. I'd like to see double that fine.
The problem with that is that bins are usually where people spend a lot of time. For example bus stops or benches in a park. If you have asthma it sucks to wait for a bus when someone smokes near it.
Is that true? Then I'm surprised littering wasn't illegal before. (Or this this a case of "oh no, people are doing [something illegal]! let's make it illegal!"?)
If crows unionize and start demanding maternity leave and other benefits they should be entitled to I could see how they would become more expensive than humans considering their reproduction rate. So in the end this seems more like exploiting workers unaware of their legal rights.
And let's ignore the fact they mention only crows as if magpies were not allowed to participate or are they overqualified for this position?
If any crow reads this contact me at 1-800-CROWHELP to help you claim all the benefits.
https://michaelhendrick.files.wordpress.com/2012/02/chickens...
That indeed would be a good income for billions, if they wouldn’t have to live in Sweden to do the job.
Startup idea: small drones for picking up trash, operated remotely by humans living in some poor country.
If the median per capita income is still what it was in 2013[1], $1.5 / hr would beat it.
[1] https://news.gallup.com/poll/166211/worldwide-median-househo...
You'd need to house, feed etc the workers at first-world standards (or pay them enough) which makes up the current costs. Anything else is basically slave labor.
Kind of how there (still) is a tax on empty CD media...