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The book explores birds as thinkers (contrary to the cliché "bird brain") in the context of observed behavior in the wild and brings to it the scientific findings from lab and field research. [2] New research suggests that some birds, such as those in the family corvidae, can rival primates and even humans in forms of intelligence.
Alex (May 18, 1976 – September 6, 2007) [1] was a grey parrot and the subject of a thirty-year experiment by animal psychologist Irene Pepperberg, initially at the University of Arizona and later at Harvard University and Brandeis University.
The birds were first trained on a limited set of paintings. The experiment has shown that a pigeon was able to obtain food by repeated pecking when shown a painting from Picasso; when it was a Monet, pecking had no effect. After a while, the pigeons would only peck when shown Picasso paintings.
The birds then congregate in massive flocks made up of several different species for migratory purposes. Some birds make use of teamwork while hunting. Predatory birds hunting in pairs have been observed using a "bait and switch" technique, whereby one bird will distract the prey while the other swoops in for the kill.
The word dinosaur is commonly used to refer only to non-avian dinosaurs, reflecting an outdated conception of the ancestry of avian dinosaurs, the birds. The evolutionary origin of birds was an open question in paleontology for over a century , but the modern scientific consensus is that birds evolved from small feathered theropods in the ...
Studies in bird behaviour include the use of tamed and trained birds in captivity. Studies on bird intelligence and song learning have been largely laboratory-based. Field researchers may make use of a wide range of techniques such as the use of dummy owls to elicit mobbing behaviour, and dummy males or the use of call playback to elicit ...
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Huginn and Muninn sit on Odin's shoulders in this illustration from an 18th-century Icelandic manuscript.. In Abrahamic and European mythology, medieval literature and occultism, the language of the birds is postulated as a mystical, perfect divine language, Adamic language, Enochian, angelic language or a mythical or magical language used by birds to communicate with the initiated.