Mad Mike Posted July 16, 2011 Share Posted July 16, 2011 http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2011/07/parrots-named-by-parents/ Before a green-rumped parrotlet is even able to chirp and squawk, mom and dad teach it a distinct series of sounds used by parrots to recognize a specific individual. In short, they give their nestling a name.Researchers have observed captive parrots using so-called contact calls to identify mates and family members, but didn’t know how birds were named in the wild. Maybe they didn’t learn from their parents, but had contact calls hard-wired from birth. Or maybe it was an aberration of captivity. To find out, Cornell University ornithologist Karl Berg and his team swapped eggs between nests in a wild parrotlet population they’d studied since 1987. Half the parrotlet pairs raised foster chicks, who used the contact calls demonstrated by their adoptive parents. Were the calls hard-wired, they’d have used their biological parents’ calls. I found this interesting because of some personal experiences with wild birds that frankly I found amazing. I think birds and probably most animals are in some way far more intelligent than we imagine. A couple of years ago I walked outside my house to find a flock of tiny birds (maybe 3 inches tall) singing in a tree. The thing about it is that they weren't singing randomly. They were singing a repeating pattern of notes, like a human song, in harmony. I've never heard it before or since. It's something I never knew was even possible. Then maybe about a month or so ago, I was outside and noticed one of my cats under a bush with at least a dozen birds, mostly Blue Jays but at least one or two Cat Birds a Cardinal and maybe one or two other species squawking like hell and harassing the cat. I walked over to see what was going on and found what I thought was a small dead Blue Jay and thought sadly that the cat had killed it. So I chased off the cat and went to find something to pick up the bird and throw it in the trash. That's when it got interesting... It turned out that this young Blue Jay was playing dead and as I tried to pick it up is jumped up and started hopping off, trying to fly. The cat of course started creeping back and I chased her away again and then went after the bird thinking I might help it if it was injured. At this point the dozen or so birds around it were still squawking but much more calmly and the young bird had made it's way relative safety near some bushes on the far end of my neighbors yard. I was going to try again to pick it up again when the birds started landing in close to me in the bushes and I swear, they were chirping at me calmly as if to say "thanks, but we've got it from here". I know it sounds silly, but I **** you not. It was a distinct impression. So much so that I looked up and said out loud "Ok, he's all yours. Good luck." as I backed away and it honestly felt like a real communication, not of words, but intent. I mean I actually got a sense of gratitude from the tone of their chirps. So I let them be and just made sure the cat did not come back. Three things struck me about the incident. 1) Multiple species were cooperating against a common foe (the cat). 2) They really seemed to understand my intent. And 3) They honestly seemed to be communicating between themselves and trying to communicate to me. When you consider this with such things as the confirmed research that crows can identify and remember individual humans, it make me wonder just how intelligent birds and other creatures really are. Maybe far more intelligent than we ever imagined. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hubbs Posted July 16, 2011 Share Posted July 16, 2011 The animal kingdom can be amazing sometimes. Your bird story reminds me of those two dog stories that got a bit of worldwide attention over the past couple of years, the one where a healthy dog pulled an injured dog off of a highway (I think that was here in the States), and the other one where a healthy dog was protecting an injured dog in the wreckage of the Japanese earthquake/tsunami. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Barney B Posted July 16, 2011 Share Posted July 16, 2011 Great story, Mike. Birds are smart. If you look closely, you'll notice some evidence that all of Techboy's posts on Extremeskins are actually composed by an african grey parrot typing with his beak. Bird intelligence Kea can solve logical puzzles, such as pushing and pulling things in a certain order to get to food, and will work together to achieve a certain objective. Some have the intelligence of an average six-year-old. . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
robotfire Posted July 16, 2011 Share Posted July 16, 2011 I had a cat that I had to pill every day, because she was pretty sick. She HATED being pilled, and she would really fight me. Sometimes, my other cat would attack me when I pilled her. He thought I was attacking her, and he stood up for her. I always thought cats were too stupid for something like that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hubbs Posted July 16, 2011 Share Posted July 16, 2011 Birds are smart. If you look closely, you'll notice some evidence that all of Techboy's posts on Extremeskins are actually composed by an african grey parrot typing with his beak. :rotflmao: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
No Excuses Posted July 16, 2011 Share Posted July 16, 2011 Animal behavior is one of my favorite subjects. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dhi-SYxNPFw http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vR9X3gFTpL0&feature=related Fascinating stuff. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mad Mike Posted July 16, 2011 Author Share Posted July 16, 2011 Birds are smart. If you look closely, you'll notice some evidence that all of Techboy's posts on Extremeskins are actually composed by an african grey parrot typing with his beak. Nothing against techboy but that made me LOL. I had a cat that I had to pill every day, because she was pretty sick. She HATED being pilled, and she would really fight me. Sometimes, my other cat would attack me when I pilled her. He thought I was attacking her, and he stood up for her. I always thought cats were too stupid for something like that. Are you kidding me? Cats are smart as hell and every one has a very unique personality. I swear, my oldest cat and the one I love the most, understands more than you can imagine. The other day he was sitting in the kitchen watching me as I made some iced tea, and I said "What do you want? Do you want to go out?" When he does, he will trot over to the door. He didn't so I said "I'm going to go sit down in a second, do you want to come sit with me? At which point he stood up and walked into the other room to wait for me by my chair. I also have two white cats. One was adopted from the SPCA. The other, which I later found out was her sister through SPCA records, showed up in my garage one night. It turns out she was adopted by a family on the other side of the river, about a mile and a half away in a straight line and about three or four miles walking distance across a pretty large bridge. There was no way for that family to know who I was or my address (I was only given a general location of them by the SPCA - that's all they would say) and even if they knew, what would make that cat stick around if they had dropped her off? No. somehow that cat must have smelled her sister across the river and walked to my house herself. She just didn't want to be separated. What's more, if you understand the personality of the cat I originally adopted, you understand why. She is the most loving and motherly cat you have ever seen and the two had a clear bond. Since the other family never came to the SPCA to try to find her and considering the story they just said " I guess she's yours now. I swear, animals just amaze me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
techboy Posted July 16, 2011 Share Posted July 16, 2011 Birds are smart. If you look closely, you'll notice some evidence that all of Techboy's posts on Extremeskins are actually composed by an african grey parrot typing with his beak. Actually, I'm a Norweigan Blue. I have lovely plumage, you know. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dreamshatterer Posted July 17, 2011 Share Posted July 17, 2011 Youtube the bird that was on the kickoff coverage team for the Raiders. Was in perfect formation the whole way. I would share the link but youtube is blocked at work. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bang Posted July 17, 2011 Share Posted July 17, 2011 My woods are full of birds, obviously, and I think there is something to this.. at times, weird as it may sound, you can hear conversations as they go back and forth through the woods. There's definitely repeating patterns by multiple birds in different locations. My neighbors own cats and they roam, and you definitely know when one is lurking in the woods. The Jays start a specific cry, and that cry is picked up again and again .. through my woods, to jays across the street,, to jays across the other street that borders my woods.. and pretty soon the cat is pinpointed. I know exactly where it is because the jays come from all over and harrass it. Crows are amazing,, I think China or someone posted up an article a few months back about how a group of researchers put on skin masks, captured seven crows, held them captive for a couple hours and released them. Then the researchers went walking around campus, and when they put the masks on, crows began attacking them. Masks off,, crows dont' attack.. masks on, crows do,, not just the seven, but ALL crows. So, the crows not only recognize their captors,, they told other crows what they looked like. The researchers did this over a period of several years. they never kidnapped any more crows, but every time they put the masks on and went out, they were attacked by crows. And they also surmised that because the test went on so long, and the results stayed so uniform, the crows not only told other crows, but the knowledge was passed generationally since the original group of crows were much older than the crows who were attacking them a few years later. They even tried different masks, no attack. Only when they put on the masks they wore when they caught the seven crows were they attacked. ~Bang Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
techboy Posted July 17, 2011 Share Posted July 17, 2011 Crows are amazing,, I think China or someone posted up an article a few months back about how a group of researchers put on skin masks, captured seven crows, held them captive for a couple hours and released them. I think it was China and an article from cracked.com, but here's one from Science Now with video. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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