A LITTLE WOODLAND MISDIRECTION

The Secret Pantry

One precious acorn. Two curious neighbors.
Take the quiet way home.

Crow sees arrivalsMagpie sees arrivalsGolden pantry

WHO REMEMBERS WHAT?

Leave a little mystery.

Follow copper paths. Place the acorn in the golden pantry while every neighbor remembers a different stump.

Time moves only when you do.

No clock. No stealing. Just a very clever jay.

Source & credits

An original MIT game inspired by 2026 research on corvid cognition and cache memory. These invented deterministic bird rules are a playful puzzle, not a model of animal minds.

GitHub research reference only: FoodCachingExperiments.jl (MIT). No code, data or artwork reused. July 2026 review · August 2026 research · Game MIT license. Six GPT-generated sprites bundled locally.

LET’S KEEP AN ACORN SECRET

A neighbor remembers only what it sees.

Your jay carries the acorn beneath a wing. Tap an adjacent stump along a copper path to fly there and tuck it inside.

A colored dot means that bird sees arrivals at that stump this beat. It remembers the newest arrival it sees. Taking an acorn out is hidden; looking later never opens a covered cache. A missed arrival leaves its old memory unchanged.

After each move or wait, the birds turn their gaze. Their current and next watched stumps are listed. Waiting changes the gaze without showing the acorn.

Reach the golden pantry while every bird remembers some other stump, then Tuck in for winter. Their remembered stumps are marked C and M. Undo, restart and true route hints are unlimited.

Keyboard: 1–8 visit a stump, W wait, Z undo, R restart, H hint. Tab and Enter reach all controls. Nothing runs on a timer.