Conscious?

Interesting thought experiment going on in our house this week, are animals conscious in the same way that we (Humans) are? The reason this particular debate was sparked was that we discovered a dead pigeon in our garden the other day, killed in a flurry of grey feathers by perhaps a fox or possibly a cat, certainly some unknown and deadly assassin. 

The interesting thing about this particular fatality was that the aforementioned pigeon had a long-standing partner and we regularly saw them together in the garden (particularly during lock-down), they were a breeding pair and have been resident in our garden for several years. The partner of the deceased survived the attack unscathed, and could be seen wandering around the garden seemingly "looking" for his or her lost other (pigeons mate for life). Now, you could argue that the remaining bird was simply plodding around the same territory as it was before looking for food as it would have done with it's partner, on the other hand it did look to us like it was lingering slightly longer at certain points and looking slightly more intently when passing the place where the dirty deed was done. Perhaps we are anthropomorphizing the situation or perhaps we are sensing a very subtle change in behaviour that represents a sophisticated consciousness at work. Perhaps we will never know, but in any case it's an interesting Biological and philosophical question for us to think about!