Birds have an amazing ability to hide somewhere. Amazing animal abilities. place. Eagle: keen vision
Helmeted basilisk (lat. Basiliscus plumifrons) is an amazing lizard that lives in Central America. This creature has a funny ability to move on the surface of the water. The lizard spends most of its time in coastal trees and bushes, waiting for the right moment to feast on insects or small vertebrates, such as mice.
As soon as an opportunity arises, the helmet-bearing basilisk rushes headlong after its prey, grabbing it with sharp claws and quickly devouring the victim. But as soon as you scare the basilisk, it instantly leaves its home, rushing into an incredible run on its hind legs along the surface of the reservoir.
At the same time, the lizard helps itself with its tail to maintain balance. In addition to the ability to move on its hind legs on the surface of the water, the helmeted basilisk is known for its ability to move at high speed on land (about 11 kilometers per hour!), as well as the ability to stay under water for at least half an hour.
9th place. English Bloodhound: super sense of smell
Under the lazy half-closed eyes of the English bloodhound there is... a nose. But this is not just a nose, but a nose for all noses! It is one of the most sensitive noses in the world, millions of times more sensitive than the human nose.
Of course, such a property should not simply go to waste. That's why this dog breed is very popular with police officers. The use of English hounds in police work makes it possible to easily solve many complex crimes and find hundreds of missing people.
This dog's nose has more than 200 million so-called olfactory cells that are capable of picking up one scent in a thousand and following it for days. Add to such a remarkable ability the incredible tenacity of this dog and you will get the ideal detective created by nature itself!
8th place. Eagle: keen vision
All birds of prey have fairly acute vision. They simply need it, since these birds have nothing else to rely on during the hunting process. According to zoologists, the vision of an eagle is four times more powerful than that of a human.
For such vision, the bird should be grateful to a natural anatomical adaptation: the eagle’s large pupils allow the effect of light refraction to be minimized. In addition, there is a kind of growth around each eye that protects the eyes from bright sunlight.
The eyes of an eagle are distinguished by a high concentration of so-called cone-shaped visual cells. What does this give? The eagle is able to determine the location of prey in space with amazing accuracy, despite the fact that the latter may be hundreds of meters away from the predator.
Actually, this is where the well-known expression “eagle eye” comes from, which is often applied to a person with fairly acute vision.
7th place. Dung beetle: night navigator
The dung beetle is already known for its ability to roll balls from the excrement of various animals that are many times larger than its own size, and roll them over long distances.
In the course of recent research, another unusual property in one of the dung beetle species ( Scarabaeus zambesianus), living in Africa. Scientists suggest that this beetle is able to navigate in space using polarized light reflected by the moon.
Very often these insects were observed rolling balls of dung in the direct rays of moonlight. At the same time, they continued to do this precisely in the rays of the moon, regardless of any obstacle encountered on their way. It looks as if the beetles are able to see the result of the polarization of moonlight interacting with particles in the atmosphere.
This is how we help them purposefully move towards their goal. When there is no moon, the beetles lose their way and wander, which often does not allow them to roll their “precious” to its destination.
6th place. Puma: jumping
Possessing extraordinary strength and the ability to develop high speed when running, the puma is one of the most formidable predators on our planet. And it is precisely thanks to its ability to make breathtakingly wide jumps that the puma takes a solid sixth place in our top.
The puma is also called a mountain lion, cougar or panther. This animal has prominent hind limbs and large paws, designed for great jumps. From a standing position, a puma can jump vertically upward to a height of more than five meters.
If a puma takes a running jump, it can easily overcome the 12-meter mark in a horizontal jump. Of course, this unique ability helps the animal primarily in hunting. The puma usually sneaks up on the prey unnoticed at a distance sufficient for a jump, and with a swift jerk “shoots” its body straight towards the prey, grabbing it by the neck with its sharp fangs.
5th place. Bats: echolocation
Bats have a wide variety of amazing adaptations that Mother Nature has given them. For example, many mice spend most of their time hanging upside down. And others feed on the blood of many animals, which is why they have gained notoriety as ghouls and vampires.
But perhaps one of the most amazing features of bats is their ability to hunt using the effect of echolocation.
Mice send high frequency signals into space while in flight. They then receive variations of these signals in the form of an echo that bounces back from any object - even something as small as an insect. Using an echolocation system, bats are able to catch and eat up to 1000 different flying insects and beetles per night. And all the hunting takes place on the fly!
4th place. Sharks: electroreceptors
According to scientists, sharks are the most successful species (in terms of evolutionary development) among all other species on our planet.
They owe such an amazing adaptation to the outside world to a number of exceptional features that are unique to them.
Special electroreceptor cells are probably one of nature’s most valuable “inventions” created for sharks. Due to the presence of similar cells in their heads, sharks are particularly sensitive to electrical impulses.
Here's how it works: if a fish swims somewhere near a shark, then the electrical signals produced by the potential prey while moving overcome the water column and penetrate its brain through special pores in the shark's head (called ampullae of Lorenzini). These pores are a continuation of the shark’s complex system of nerve endings, entangling its entire swift body.
Thanks to this unique mechanism, sharks rarely make mistakes when attacking prey. On the contrary, these terrible predators “hit” with frightening accuracy, even in muddy water.
3rd place. Cephalopods: jet engine
Cephalopods are a class of animals that include squids and octopuses. These are the fastest invertebrates in the world's oceans. And all this thanks to a unique natural system that allows you to move using the principle of a rocket engine.
When water enters the mantle cavity of an animal, it is able to hold it there as long as all its openings are closed. Everything except the special exit hole-proboscis.
The muscles of the animal's mantle cavity contract and direct water towards this very hole. When the water “shoots” out, octopuses and squids suddenly move through the water column. At the same time, the movement speed can reach 40 kilometers per hour.
Cephalopods are also able to control the direction and speed of their movements. This allows them to instantly escape from danger, or, on the contrary, to hunt quite successfully.
2nd place. Hummingbird: aerial acrobatics
Undoubtedly, hummingbirds are one of the most beautiful birds. And the beauty of a hummingbird’s flight can fascinate any observer! This bird has short and straight humerus and forearm.
The wings are attached to the shoulder joints, which are located very close to the body. This makes the wings very flexible and gives the hummingbird the ability to perform inimitable pirouettes in the air. They also flap their wings very quickly - some species of hummingbirds can beat their wings up to 80 times per second!
The wings are capable of making a figure eight, which adds maneuverability to the flight. Hummingbirds are the only birds on the planet that can fly backwards and even upside down, that is, upside down! They are also the only birds on Earth that can soar in the air - a truly breathtaking sight! This ability gives hummingbirds the ability to collect nectar from flowers by hovering over the buds for a long time.
1 place. Cheetah: running
Maybe not everyone knows that a cheetah can reach speeds of up to 110 kilometers per hour. Thus, this animal is rightfully considered the fastest mammal on the planet.
With its long legs, small head and slender body, this animal is a true embodiment of speed! When a cheetah runs, its spine flexes and extends with each step, which helps the predator move even faster during the chase.
Some calculations show that it is this ability that adds approximately 30 kilometers per hour to the running speed of the animal. However, cheetahs are forced to pay a fairly high price for their ability to develop such mind-blowing speed: the predator cannot maintain maximum speed for longer than 10 or 20 seconds, otherwise it threatens to overheat the muscles.
Since the cheetah's home is mainly shrouds and other open places, this animal must rely only on its speed. Otherwise you won’t be able to get close to the prey – there’s simply nowhere to hide! The cheetah is often forced to make an incredible leap in order to catch its prey and then try to finish it off as quickly as possible before it escapes from its clutches.
5. Helmeted Basilisk: Walking on Water The helmeted basilisk (international scientific name is Basiliscus plumifrons) is an amazing lizard that lives in Central America. This creature has a funny ability to move on the surface of the water. The lizard spends most of its time in coastal trees and bushes, waiting for the right moment to feast on insects or small vertebrates, such as mice.
As soon as an opportunity arises, the helmet-bearing basilisk rushes headlong after its prey, grabbing it with sharp claws and quickly devouring the victim. But as soon as you scare the basilisk, it instantly leaves its home, rushing into an incredible run on its hind legs along the surface of the reservoir. At the same time, the lizard helps itself with its tail to maintain balance. In addition to the ability to move on its hind legs on the surface of the water, the helmeted basilisk is known for its ability to move at high speed on land (about 11 kilometers per hour!), as well as the ability to stay under water for at least half an hour.
4. Eagle: keen vision All birds of prey have fairly acute vision. They simply need such vision, since these birds have nothing else to rely on during the hunting process. According to zoologists, the vision of an eagle is four times more powerful than that of a human.
For such vision, the bird should be grateful to a natural anatomical adaptation: the eagle’s large pupils allow the effect of light refraction to be minimized. In addition, there is a kind of growth around each eye that protects the eyes from bright sunlight. The eyes of an eagle are distinguished by a high concentration of so-called cone-shaped visual cells. What does this give? The eagle is able to determine the location of prey in space with amazing accuracy, despite the fact that the latter may be hundreds of meters away from the predator. Actually, this is where the well-known phrase “eagle eye” comes from, which is often applied to a person with fairly acute vision.
3. Puma: jumping Possessing extraordinary strength and capable of reaching high speeds when running, the puma is one of the most formidable predators on our planet. And it is precisely thanks to its ability to make breathtaking jumps in its range that the puma takes a solid third place in our top.
The puma is also called the mountain lion, cougar or panther. This animal has prominent hind limbs and large paws, designed for great jumps. From a standing position, a puma can jump horizontally upward to a height of up to five meters. If a puma jumps with a running start, it can easily cover the 12-meter mark in a horizontal jump. Of course, this unique ability helps this animal primarily in hunting. The puma usually sneaks up on the prey unnoticed at a distance sufficient for a jump, and with a swift jerk “shoots” its body straight towards the prey, grabbing it by the neck with its sharp fangs.
2. Hummingbird: aerial acrobatics Undoubtedly, hummingbirds are one of the most beautiful birds. And the beauty of a hummingbird’s flight can fascinate any observer! This bird has short and straight humerus and forearm.
1. Cheetah: running Maybe not everyone knows that a cheetah can reach speeds of up to 110 kilometers per hour. Thus, this animal is rightfully considered the fastest mammal on the planet.
With its long legs, small head and slender body, this animal is a true embodiment of speed! When a cheetah runs, its spine flexes and extends with each step, which helps the predator move even faster during the chase. Some calculations show that it is this ability that adds approximately 30 kilometers per hour to the running speed of the animal. However, cheetahs are forced to pay a fairly high price for their ability to develop such mind-blowing speed: the predator cannot maintain maximum speed for longer than 10 or 20 seconds, otherwise it threatens to overheat the muscles. Since the cheetah's home is mainly shrouds and other open places, this animal must rely only on its speed. Otherwise you won’t be able to get close to the prey – there’s simply nowhere to hide! The cheetah is often forced to make an incredible leap in order to catch its prey and then try to finish it off as quickly as possible before it escapes from its clutches.
Even in ancient times, people, observing the behavior of animals, became convinced that they sense natural phenomena more subtly. How do they manifest themselves? amazing animal abilities and what are the reasons for their occurrence?
Animals feel an earthquake coming
It has been noticed that before the onset of earthquakes, different animals behave differently than usual. Fish and other inhabitants of water bodies usually float to the surface; animals living in the ground leave their holes and crawl out; In winter, animals wake up from hibernation and leave their shelters. Many animals worry, tremble, and move to safer territories. It is almost impossible to predict where on the planet the next disaster will occur. Therefore, in places with an increased risk of earthquakes, people carefully monitor the behavior of animals.
There were cases when it was thanks to our smaller brothers that we managed to escape. Scientists are still debating how animals sense the approach of disaster. One version is that they can sense changes magnetic field Lands that occur before an earthquake. Small magnetic grains were found in the bones of animals' limbs, thanks to which they detect these changes.
Therefore, animals sense the approach of an earthquake.
Birds sense the approaching rain
People have been observing the behavior of representatives of the animal world for many years, which has made it possible to establish a large number of signs that accurately predict the weather. In nature, there are more than 600 species of animals that are capable of detecting the slightest changes in the atmosphere. These abilities have developed through evolution and natural selection and made it possible to prepare and more easily endure difficult weather conditions. Many birds are especially sensitive to weather changes. This amazing instinct has been explained in science. They respond to changes in air pressure, temperature and humidity, intensity sun rays, to reduce illumination when clouds appear and to change electric field in the atmosphere before thunderstorms.
The behavior of many insect-eating birds depends on the activity of their prey. For example, swallows fly high in the sky on fine clear days, and before bad weather they hunt closer to earth's surface. And all because insects in good weather are able to rise high in currents of warm air, and before the rain they hide in the grass or stay low above the ground.
Therefore, birds sense the approach of rain.
Animals heal people
Some animals show not just amazing, but supernatural (extrasensory) abilities in healing people. Cat therapy and dolphin therapy have proven healing properties on the human body. Thanks to their powerful electromagnetic field, these animals come into bioenergetic contact, which has a beneficial effect on human health. For example, cats produce low-frequency currents. According to scientists, they are able to produce them thanks to their thin and delicate wool. When the animal moves, the hairs rub against each other, resulting in a powerful electric field. By affecting the source of inflammation, currents kill microbes. In addition, tissue healing occurs faster and their blood supply improves. Dogs also have a positive effect on the psyche of their owners.
Dolphin therapy helps in the treatment of people with diseases of the nervous system, improves the condition of patients suffering from neuropsychiatric disorders, relieves chronic pain, and promotes speech development in children.
To date, not all the capabilities of animals have been studied, not all the secrets of their perception of the world around them have been revealed. Scientists are actively working in this direction, organizing scientific research and conducting experiments. Obviously, in the future we will learn much more about the supernatural abilities of animals.
The natural abilities of some animals manifest themselves in their unusual skills.
Unusual animal skills
Some fish fly
In the tropical waters of the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans, as well as some seas, there are quite amazing fish that look very much like birds. The ability to fly was given to flying fish by nature to save them from underwater predators. Although it happens that they fly without any reason. Distinctive feature These fish have unusually large and hard pectoral or pelvic fins, very similar in appearance to wings. They have a special wedge-shaped tail design, the lower blade of which is larger than the upper.
Small flying fish. Their largest representatives reach a length of 45 centimeters. They are also distinguished by the presence of a large swim bladder that runs under the spine all the way to the tail. Before flying, the fish accelerates in the water and swims close to its surface. It develops good speed with the help of the energetic work of its tail, after which it breaks out of the water, spreads its fins and soars, sometimes pushing off the crests of the waves. Flying fish are capable of both covering hundreds of meters above water, reaching speeds of up to 80 km/h, and flying quite high above its surface.
Water striders can run on water
Water striders are a type of bug that lives on water. The body of these insects is very light - in the largest individuals it reaches 30 mm in length, and the limbs are thin and long. The water strider's legs are equipped with hard, waterproof hairs, thanks to which they easily stay on the surface of the water and move freely along it. To move, the water strider uses two pairs of widely spaced legs, middle and hind. Moving her legs in different directions, she turns around. The forelimbs are shorter and are used to change the speed of movement or to capture prey.
Water striders feed on other insects that fall to the surface of the water. They quickly find food thanks to good vision and the ability to transmit and receive information through vibrations of the water surface. These creatures not only know how to deftly glide through the water, but also make long leaps, jumping over various obstacles or eluding predators. With the onset of cold weather and the disappearance of food, water striders get out of reservoirs and take refuge in old stumps or moss for the winter.
But even a light water strider would still drown if there were no force in nature called surface tension. Under the influence of this force, water molecules are attracted to each other, and an elastic “skin” is formed on the surface.
Chameleons change the color of their skin and can look in different directions at the same time
Chameleons have the ability to change their color from bright green to gray-black or yellow. By nature, they are endowed with transparent skin, under which there are red, black and yellow cells. If a chameleon is angry or afraid, its nervous system sends signals to these cells and they respond by contracting or expanding, causing the skin to appear to change color. When an animal is angry, its skin becomes dark; when excited or afraid, it acquires pale yellow shades. If the lizard is in a calm state, its skin is colored reddish-brown, sometimes with transverse stripes.
Chameleons' eyes rotate like gun turrets. At the same time, they can simultaneously look in different directions. So the chameleon’s field of vision is very wide - a rare midge will escape unnoticed by such an observant hunter.
By the way, this lizard’s tongue is not just long - it is longer than its entire body! The chameleon sharply shoots it out of its mouth, and after a split second it pulls it back in with its prey - some insect stuck to the sticky suction cup on the tip of its tongue.
Ducks don't get wet in water
The plumage of all waterfowl is very dense and waterproof. The special structure of the feathers is ensured by the presence of microscopic bristles equipped with hooks. When a bird shakes its feathers, they stick together, forming a very strong connection. And the water-repellent property of their plumage is ensured by a special fatty lubricant secreted by the coccygeal gland of waterfowl.
All ducks take special care of their feathers and the skin underneath them. First, they are washed well and shaken off, after which a fatty lubricant is carefully applied with the beak and distributed over their entire surface. The head is smeared using paws or rubbing on the back. Thanks to this care, the duck can swim and dive in the water for a long time, while remaining dry, and calmly take off from the surface of the reservoir.
However, if a waterfowl is deprived of grooming for several days, or if the water contains a grease neutralizing detergent, its feathers will quickly become wet, and the bird may even drown as the wet feathers become very heavy.
Hummingbirds can fly backwards
The world of birds also has its own “helicopters”. These are hummingbirds, the smallest birds in the world. The pygmy hummingbird, or bumblebee hummingbird, hatches its chicks in a nest the size of a walnut. These miniature birds have the ability to fly in all directions - forward, backward, sideways, up and down. They can even hover in the air, staying in one place.
Tardigrades have uncanny durability
The microscopic invertebrate animal tardigrade, also called the little water bear, has incredible vitality. It is capable of entering a state of cryptobiosis and can survive even under the most extreme conditions: helium cooling to −271 °C, heating to 100 °C, irradiation of 570,000 roentgens. For comparison, the lethal dose for humans is only 500 roentgens. The tardigrade can even live in space, where, as is known, there is no air. This amazing creature does not have a respiratory or circulatory system; it breathes through the skin, and the function of blood is performed by the fluid that fills the body cavity.
Dung beetles have heroic strength
The dung beetle, called the bull beetle, or two-horned dung beetle, is capable of supporting a load exceeding its own body weight by more than 1,000 times. Such impressive results during the study were shown by well-fed individuals. If a 70-kilogram man had such strength, he would be able to lift 80 tons of weight. Dung beetles have horns with which they fight for the female, demonstrating their phenomenal strength.
Grasshoppers hear with their feet
The superfamily Grasshoppers, which belong to long-whiskered orthoptera insects, have a hearing organ on the front legs. Of course, the “ears” of a grasshopper are not at all like our ears. These are just tiny holes covered with thin skin, like tiny drums.
Honey bees detect taste with their feet
Most insects taste food with their mouths, just like humans. However, honey bees also sense taste with their paws. A bee only has to land on a flower and it already knows what it tastes like.
Currently, birds have begun to attract Special attention ethologists. This is due to the relatively recently discovered ability of birds not only for expedient plasticity of behavior, for learning, but also for rational activity. Moreover, birds exhibit such qualities both in their natural habitat and in experimental conditions.
Finally, prejudice against the rational abilities of birds and other animals began to crumble. Indeed, since the second half of the 19th century, scientists have attached exceptional importance to anatomy. Otherwise, it would be difficult to arrange all living beings on the “rungs of the ladder” according to their level of complexity: from the “protozoa” to monkeys. Since the complex behavior of living beings, even invertebrates, did not fit into the given framework of this sequence, it was no longer given due attention. At the same time, serious ethological and zoopsychological research was widely carried out only in relation to primates.
As for birds, ornithologists believed that they were endowed only with instincts, because it was believed that “the cerebral cortex of birds is undeveloped.”
And only from the mid-twentieth century the opinion regarding birds changed to the completely opposite. Experiments have shown that they have excellent memory, the ability to learn and develop conditioned reflexes. Therefore, most birds are easy to train. Moreover, in terms of their rational activity, birds, for example ravens (or corvids), are not inferior to the so-called “higher” mammals, and in many ways surpass them.
Let's look at some examples of the behavioral capabilities and abilities of birds.
Hereditary manifestations of memory
The ability to find a home and food sources. Many birds, upon returning to their homeland from distant countries, use their memory to find their native nests. So, after winter, rooks fly from afar to their original place and build nests next to the old nest. Even chickens are able to recognize their coop after several years.
Or pied flycatchers. Their males definitely return in early May to the same places where they bred a year ago. Memory allows them to find their nest boxes and titmouses, but the path for these birds is not close - from Africa. During their trip, they fly over thirty countries of the world, and when they return, they easily find their native nest. Female pied flycatchers and young birds are less attached to home and return to their nesting grounds much less often than adult males.
Some raven birds store food in the fall, and quickly find them in winter and spring. The ant woodpecker also makes supplies - in a piecemeal way. He makes holes in the tree bark and places an acorn in each of them. These small storehouses can be so numerous that they are guarded by an entire family, but the birds manage to remember each storeroom and then use it in times of famine.
Birds that feed on the nectar of flowers also have a good memory. Thus, Hawaiian trees know the main sources of food and remember well those places where they have already visited and drank flower nectar. Therefore, they never waste time on useless searches.
Innate ability to imitate. Many birds are able to retain traces of everything they hear and see from their parents, flock mates, and even from representatives of other species. Parrots, starlings, and ravens are endowed with the ability for onomatopoeia; it does not betray them even in natural conditions and in captivity.
For example, the common starling remembers and is able to accurately reproduce the voices of birds such as thrush, oriole, chaffinch, jackdaw, whirligig, and black grouse. Actually, his song is made up of parts of their songs, listening to which it is interesting to guess the next melody. Either he will chirp like a swallow, then he will scream like a kestrel, or even cluck like a chicken.
The starling includes in his song other sounds he overheard made by animals - the croaking of a frog, the neighing of a foal, the barking of a dog, as well as sounds from our everyday life - the roar of an engine, the creaking of a door, the clanking of buckets and even the clatter of a typewriter. Living in captivity, the starling can learn individual words of human speech and short sentences.
The importance of imitation in the avian community is still not fully understood.
Among our songbirds, the marsh warbler can rightfully be called an outstanding traveler and linguist with an excellent memory. She is given amazing abilities to quickly “grasp”, remember for a long time and accurately reproduce sounds made by other birds.
This little brown bird lives in its native Central Europe for only two months and spends most of the year in Zambia. Its route to North Africa lies through the Middle East, the Arabian Peninsula, and the Red Sea. And despite the fact that warblers begin their 8,000-kilometer journey at a very young age, they know the landmarks to their native places well and never go astray, flying to the same bushes year after year.
In addition, during migration, memory allows birds to remember the calls of many birds they meet along the way. The warbler can imitate the calls of more than 210 species of birds. As observations have shown, one marsh warbler was able to imitate the voices of 76 within 35 minutes various types birds. Having returned from the southern regions to Europe, these birds imitate foreign “languages” for another three or four days, and only then switch to their native language. Therefore, often in European areas in the first days after the arrival of these amazing “polyglots” you can hear a completely plausible imitation of the singing of many southern exotic birds.
Learning ability
The fact that birds are highly trained and endowed with elementary rational activity significantly expands the norm of their behavioral response, making behavior plastic and flexible, adequate to constantly changing environmental conditions.
Learning, harmoniously woven into natural behavior birds in natural conditions is the subject of study by ornithologists. It is carefully analyzed. By watching their parents, birds learn to obtain food. So, some of them knock on the shells, breaking them, while others hit the joints of the valves, forcing them to open. Once a young bird has mastered one of these techniques, it will use it for the rest of its life.
The learning abilities of birds of various species are confirmed both by observations of their behavior in their natural habitat and by special studies in laboratory conditions.
Musical memory and learning. An organ crow lives on the island of Tasmania. Hearing her sing, you can quite believe that a real organ is playing. This crow is easily tamed, and in captivity it can be taught to whistle various melodies.
The common starling is endowed with an excellent musical memory. It is interesting that, like a conductor, he accompanies his singing with rhythmic flapping of his wings. There are many funny incidents from the life of this skilled imitator. One great fan of birds taught his starling to whistle the Marseillaise. And when he released the bird into the wild, he soon witnessed a unique event - a polyphonic choir of starlings sang this French anthem in unison. That is, the bird not only learned the melody, but passed it on to its fellow birds.
Parrots also demonstrate vivid manifestations of musical memory. One famous gray parrot learned and was able to whistle many popular roles from operas and operettas. He perfectly remembered and counted melodies and beats, and if he accidentally went out of tune, he immediately stopped, as if thinking, and repeated the melody from the beginning.
Another parrot, living in one Moscow family, collected in its memory and whistled the melodies of such songs as, for example, “Bravely, comrades in step,” “Why do you girls love beautiful ones,” and even knew the children’s song of the crocodile Gena.
The ability to imitate human speech. Paradoxically, birds are the only representatives of the animal world that have the innate ability to learn to reproduce articulate human speech. Although their vocal organs are structured fundamentally differently than those of all mammals and humans. And apes, whose vocal apparatus is seemingly no different from ours, cannot clearly pronounce a single word.
Many representatives of the raven family - crows, rooks, jays and jackdaws - can learn to reproduce human speech relatively accurately. Since time immemorial, it has been customary in Rus' to keep talking starlings.
Their close relatives, the Indian and Central Asian mynas, have the best ability to pronounce words. Sustainable mynah populations are now known in the European part of our country. The ancestors of these colonies were birds from Tajikistan, purchased from pet stores by hobbyists to teach them the Russian language. Mynas do have such abilities, but keeping such a noisy bird in an apartment is no pleasure. Therefore, most of these talkative birds sooner or later ended up on the street, giving rise to a population of mynahs, in the same Moscow.
Parrots are, of course, excellent imitators and talkers. The most famous among them is the gray parrot, or gray parrot, an inhabitant of tropical forests West and Central Africa. Thanks to his memory, his vocabulary contains hundreds of words, many phrases, excerpts from poems, and pieces of music.
Parrots not only remember and reproduce all this, but also accurately copy the sound of the voice. The Gray's acoustic repertoire is not at all limited to the sounds of human speech. They are capable of imitating and accurately reproducing hundreds of other sounds of a wide variety of nature. From the crowing of a rooster, the meowing of a cat, the barking of a dog, the singing of wild and domestic birds to telephone and doorbells.
Pigeon mail". People used pigeons in every possible way, including in a very prosaic way - as a source of food. But first of all, tamed pigeons served as “postmen.” Birds of selected breeds have worked in this capacity since the time of the pharaohs in ancient Egyptian temples. In Europe in the 11th - 13th centuries, a homing pigeon cost no less than a purebred Arabian stallion. After all, knights, with the help of feathered couriers, maintained business connections between castles or conducted personal correspondence.
Why were pigeons used? The answer is simple: they are well tamed, have excellent memory, attachment to nesting sites and excellent navigational abilities.
Important written messages transmitted by pigeons were called pigeongrams. The breeding and selection of pigeon “postmen”, mainly for military purposes, were specially carried out in Ancient Egypt, Ancient Greece, in the Roman Empire.
Many pigeons “served in the army” in later times. Thus, during the years of the Franco-Prussian War (1870 - 1871), carrier pigeons delivered more than a million letters. Pigeons from Paris, besieged by the Germans, flew with dispatches through shrapnel and gunfire and sometimes reached their pigeon coops wounded and even losing their sight. To intercept the feathered couriers, the Germans sent “squadrons” of falcons to the front, and the pigeons began to die one after another. But the French solved the problem in an original way by equipping the pigeons with a weapon of intimidation - they began to attach tiny whistles to their tails. Falcons were afraid to attack whistling birds.
In Russia in the First world war pigeons carried mail on all fronts. Military field pigeons were trained in the necessary skills and ringed in a nursery located in Ostankino, which was a village in those years.
Even during the Great Patriotic War, despite the perfection of technical means of communication, many military reports were transmitted on the wings of pigeons. So, in 1942, the Nazis damaged an English submarine with depth charges. She could not get off the ground and would have died if a feathered couple had not been kept on her - a dove and a dove. They were released to the surface in a small capsule through a torpedo tube. The dove was obviously overwhelmed by the storm wave, but the dove still managed to get to the base. Thanks to the pigeongram, the crew of the submarine was saved, and a monument was later erected to the feathered “postman”.
The military also adopted the principle of the pigeon’s special vision. His eyes can select only the necessary information from the entire field of vision. This feature was studied and used by specialists from one of the US aviation companies. Thanks to this, an “electronic eye” was developed, or rather, a model of the retina of a pigeon eye (145 light-sensitive photoreceptors and 386 “neurons” - artificial nerve cells). Such an “eye” is capable of determining the direction and speed of movement of an object, its shape and size. It can, for example, recognize a bomber and a missile without noticing other flying objects.
Help for the injured and sick. Based on the fact that a pigeon's vision is many times sharper than that of a human, the American Water Rescue Society is preparing a program to use trained pigeons to search for people on the high seas. The birds will fly in helicopters together with rescue teams and, upon seeing an orange flag (a common signal for help), give a prearranged signal.
Pigeons are also used for therapeutic purposes. There are positive experiences from hospitals where these wonderful birds walk between the beds of bedridden people. A dovecote is specially located next to the department. Patients, constantly observing well-groomed and healthy birds, discuss their impressions of them and nature. All together - medicines, fresh air, gently cooing doves and memories of patients about the beauty and amazing manifestations in the living world contribute to their recovery.
Controller's work. One interesting application of the ability of pigeons to retain a strong image in memory is the use of these birds in the inspection of finished products. Animal psychologists advised this, since pigeons, firstly, perfectly remember the standard of the object, secondly, have excellent vision, and thirdly, they are not burdened by monotonous work and work concentratedly and diligently.
The pigeons mastered the complex profession of controller in 3-4 days. A cage with a bird, in the bottom of which two plates were mounted, was placed near a conveyor with ready-made medicines. When a well-closed box moved, the pigeons pecked one plate, and if it was defective, another. The birds proved themselves to be extremely observant controllers. While sorting containers for medicines, they did not miss a single poorly closed box. Pigeons found even such minor defects that a person simply could not see.
Control pigeons with their rare abilities were also used to sort balls for bearings on the conveyor belt of a Moscow plant. After short-term courses, they remembered both the image of the reference part and their tasks: when a part of proper quality moves along a conveyor belt, they need to behave calmly, but if the part has deviations, they should peck at the lever. The mechanism will release this part from the belt, and the feeder will open in front of the beak for a while.
On the first day the pigeons worked normally, but the next day they began to reject all the balls in a row. It turned out that the birds quickly “improved their skills” - they began to send balls with fingerprints to marriage. To prevent the birds from considering them defective, the balls had to be wiped before presenting them to the feathered controllers.
Pigeons are able to see not only the finest defects on the surface of polished parts, but also tiny cracks in the glass.
Representatives of other professions also became interested in the amazing abilities of pigeons. For example, because the color vision of pigeons is better than that of humans. Pigeons distinguish the slightest shades of color that elude the eye of even highly qualified textile specialists who sort fabrics.
Experts of artists' paintings. Japanese animal psychologists conducted an interesting experiment, teaching pigeons to distinguish impressionist paintings from cubist paintings. The feathered expert, trained to “recognize” a certain creative school, “pecked” only the paintings that corresponded to it. When a trained pigeon was presented with works by Monet and Picasso, the error did not exceed 10%, even if the bird was shown his previously unseen paintings. When the experimenters introduced the pigeons to the works of Cezanne and Renoir, the “experts” easily and correctly classified them into the same category as Monet. Pigeons distinguished Impressionist paintings from works by Cubists such as Georges Braque without apparent difficulty.
According to a professional art critic, pigeons simply learned to recognize the simplest signs inherent in these schools - the presence or absence of sharp corners or the clear and bright colors characteristic of Cubism. After all, impressionism is characterized by blurred contours and pastel colors, which should catch the bird’s eye.
However, scientists have conducted an experiment confirming that pigeons are infallible experts. Birds recognized the style when they were shown reproductions that were specially “smudged” or reproduced in black and white. Birds, like us humans, used not one, but a whole complex of signs when perceiving an image.
Elementary rational activity
Many animals are endowed with the innate ability of so-called "specific movements of intention", which indicate exactly what the animal will do. They allow humans and other species to predict the animal's future behavior. That is, animals perfectly predict their next steps in their behavior.
In some birds, one of the forms of instinctive behavior related to intentions is a distracting maneuver - a demonstration of false damage to the body. If a female sitting on her eggs is frightened by some predator, she will be forced to leave the nest, but at the same time try to show that she is wounded. She will limp, dragging a supposedly broken wing, luring the enemy away from the nest. At the same time, the bird is able to clearly assess the current situation and in each case acts quite intentionally. And only when the female takes the predator to a safe distance from the nest, she instantly “recovers” and flies away to return to the nest in a roundabout way. And when taken by surprise, a hoopoe sometimes resorts to another tricky maneuver: it lies flat on the ground, spreads its wings and does not move. So he seems more like a motley rag than a living bird, and he often manages to go unnoticed.
Such instinctive actions of the bird are guided by the genetic program for preserving life embedded in it. But in order to put it into action, the animal must first accurately determine the degree of danger and then purposefully use one or another method of defense.
And the partridge caught by the hunters lowers its head, sighs several times, and supposedly dies. But as soon as it is released from the hands, the bird’s eyes instantly open, it instantly jumps up, and, while the hunter comes to his senses from surprise, takes off and disappears behind the trees.
We can give many more amazing examples when birds behave in moments of danger not only instinctively, but intentionally and quite intelligently.
Until recently, scientists believed that instinctive forms of behavior predominate in birds, and their ability to learn, and especially to think, is limited.
In this regard, a variety of tests for studying the rational functioning of animals were developed for experiments on monkeys. And only when the stereotype of ideas about the abilities of birds was finally destroyed, it turned out that these tests could be successfully used for birds. These tests reproduce the problematic situations that they encounter in their natural habitat.
Due to the fact that birds have the ability for elementary rational activity, they are able to grasp many laws connecting objects and phenomena environment. That is why birds can immediately, without prior training, “reasonably” change their behavior in situations that are new to them.
"Weapon" activity. Rational use An animal's use of auxiliary objects that serve as a functional extension of any part of its body is called tool activity.
A variety of animals, including representatives of many species of birds, are endowed with this ability to manipulate objects to achieve certain goals. So, crows, and not only them, lift mollusks into the air and break their shells on stones. Or they throw down the bones to split them and eat the bone marrow.
The bearded hawk and vulture love to feast on turtle meat. To break its shield, the birds pick up the poor animal with their paws, rise with it to a considerable height and then throw the prey down.
A song thrush beats a snail on a stone as if on an anvil. Harriers of one of the species, if they cannot break the strong shell of ostrich eggs with their beak, also use a stone weighing 100-300 grams for this. Having taken it in its beak, the hawk stretches itself vertically, raising its head, and throws the stone directly onto the egg lying at its feet.
There are birds that use tool-making to build nests, for example, to connect leaves with web threads. Australian bowerbirds behave in a curious way. They specially make a small bast from the roots, then mash the blue berries, soak this bast with their juice and paint their chest and walls of the hut.
Galapagos woodpecker finches can use cactus spines to catch caterpillars. And on forest edges and among meadows in Europe and Asia, you can sometimes see beetles and other small animals impaled on the thorns of thorny bushes - this is how shrikes store food.
Jackdaws from the islands of New Caledonia themselves make a whole set of various tools. One of them is widened at the end, the other is pointed, the third has hooks. And each of these weapons is intended for its own purpose. Birds carefully keep them close to their nests.
But are all these actions meaningful, reasonable, or is it the result of purely instinctive behavior?
Since birds of certain species use such methods even at an early age, being isolated from their relatives, then, undoubtedly, they are genetically predisposed to such a specific repertoire of tool activity. That is, there is a hereditary program that directs their activities towards the manufacture and use of the necessary tools.
However, in some species of birds, tool activity is not limited only to the manifestation of instincts. Of particular interest to scientists were facts from the life of ravens, whose representatives resort to using specially prepared tools in unforeseen circumstances.
One of the most convincing evidence of intelligent tool activity was the behavior of the blue jay.
The experimental jay was left for some time without food. When food was placed in front of the cage, she began to purposefully make a device for herself in order to get to this food. The bird tore strips of paper from a newspaper lying in a cage, and, holding them with its paws, deftly bent it in half with its beak. Having made paper “sticks” in this way, the jay pushed them through the bars and raked up pieces of food lying nearby to the cage.
There is much other evidence confirming the ability of ravens not only for the intelligent use of objects as tools in an unforeseen situation, but also for other complex behavioral manifestations.
Among the variety of bird species, there are those that stand out for their unusual size - the smallest and largest birds. Birds with strange beaks and birds that dig holes are known to exist.
The largest birds
Among the birds there are very large ones. Most large birds, unfortunately, are unable to fly. The largest birds are the cassowary, ostrich and condor.Ostrich
A truly giant bird is the ostrich. It can be admired not only for its large dimensions and impressive weight, but also for its running speed. As you know, an ostrich is able to outrun a horse. In short-distance running, the bird can accelerate to seventy kilometers per hour, while it is helped by very strong legs that take four-meter steps.Cassowary
Another large bird that lacks the ability to fly is the cassowary. Her height reaches one and a half meters and her weight is eighty kilograms. The maximum speed of this bird is fifty kilometers per hour. There is a bony plate on the cassowary's skull, sometimes growing up to seventeen centimeters. For this, the Indonesians nicknamed it the horned head.Condor
Not all large birds cannot fly. There is a “giant” that rises high into the sky - this is the California condor. The Indians in the old days believed that the sun rested on the huge wings of the condor. This is not surprising, because its wingspan is three meters twenty-five centimeters. The body length of the condor itself is one meter and thirty-five centimeters. 
The albatross is also considered a large bird. He can plan in several ways. .
The smallest birds
Birds differ from each other in many respects, including size. The smallest birds are found even among predators.hummingbird bee
The islands of Pinos and Cuba are home to the world's smallest birds. We're talking about the bee hummingbird. Its weight is only 1.6 g and its length is five centimeters and seven millimeters including beak and tail. Its second name is bird-fly. 
Baby Falcon
The Black-footed Falcon is one of the miniature birds of prey. Another predator of approximately the same size is the White-fronted Falcon. Their length is fifteen centimeters and their weight is thirty-five grams. These birds live in southeast Asia and feed on dragonflies, butterflies, lizards, etc. Larger prey is inaccessible to them, since they simply will not carry it away. 
Red-headed Kinglet
The smallest bird living in Russia is called the red-headed wren. Its weight is only five and a half grams and its length is nine centimeters. The red-headed kinglet is extremely rare. 
Yellowthroat Kinglet
The yellow-throated kinglet is not only one of the smallest birds, but also the national bird of Luxembourg. The weight of this “baby” is about six grams, and the length does not exceed ten centimeters. 
The most unusual birds
The world of birds is diverse, and among all this diversity there are birds with an unusual way of hatching, non-standard appearance, special structure of legs or beak.Little Sultana
The Lesser Sultana, thanks to its long fingers, has the ability to swim like a duck, climb branches and stems of vegetation, and walk like a chicken on floating plants. All this is possible thanks to the long fingers of the sultana. 
Red-billed Alcyone
The red-billed alcyone stands out among birds due to its unusual way of incubating eggs. It is a bird of prey that feeds on songbirds, rodents, frogs, snails, etc. To hatch eggs, the alcyone builds a nest by digging a hole up to fifty centimeters long. 
Indian Hornbill
The distinctive feature of the hornbill is its massive yellow beak. On the beak there is a growth similar to a second hollow beak. By the way, scientists still cannot understand the purpose of this growth. The bird is omnivorous; it feeds on fish, a variety of fruits, and small mammals. 
Crowned flyeater
At first glance, the crowned flyeater seems like an ordinary bird, but if you tease it, it will spread a gorgeous crest. In females, the feathers of the crest are yellow or orange, in males they are fiery red. 
The strangest bird in the world
The shoebill seems to be a strange, unusual and even prehistoric bird. It is extremely little studied. This is one of the largest birds, which is a close relative of storks, pelicans, and marabou. 
On the massive head of the bird there is a huge beak with a hook at the end. The head is wide, even slightly wider than the shoebill’s body. This strange bird lives on the banks of the Nile in Africa, preferring swampy places. Its main food is lungfish protoptera.
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