when a pelican bites you there’s no malice in their eyes. they aren’t upset at you. they are just hungry and want to see if you fit in their mouths. and if you don’t then it’s no problem and everything is fine. and if you do then well i guess your fate is sealed but that’s ok it’s a beautiful animal
Okay, see, I knew about the capybara gif:
But I didn’t know that they really are That Dense, All The Time. The same way sharks will bite anything that might be a seal, just in case, these birdbrains will apparently test just about anything for beak size.
I felt like I needed to clarify some things before we could continue any more conversations on this godforsaken website.
I’m very proud of the European Robin, I think I really captured it.
this is a very accurate birb agenda illustration
European robin is LOVE and I never really thought robins in other countries wouldn’t be like our robins, because they’re cute balls of fluff and rage and I just took a pic of one of them yesterday here, have,
also one with my coworker for scale (we were both taking pics bcs we’re cute bird lovers) (all animals, really) (actually I didn’t mean for her to be in the pic but well it happened) (our uniforms suck) (we were crouching) BABY BIRB U R NOT A BABY BUT U R MY BABY LET ME HUG YOU PLS
Wait, Robins aren’t the same everywhere?!
They should be, but they aren’t! Colonists in North America named the native birds “robins” after the ones they knew in Europe, but the birds aren’t related at all, they just both have red chests.
For further astonishment:
* the 1964 film Mary Poppins is supposedly set in London, but the fake bird that young Julie Andrews holds is actually an American robin (Turdus migratorious)
* the American robin lays spectacular turquoise blue eggs, thus the term “robin’s egg blue.” This is meaningless in Europe, where robin’s eggs are beige. A paler, greener version in the UK is called “duck egg blue”.
* the “rocking robin” and the “red red robin [who] comes bob bob bobbing along” are American robins.
* Robin from Batman was probably named after Robin Hood, although he does have a red shirt.
* the meaning of the name “Robin” is just short for “Robert.” The bird in England was historically called the Redbreast, but in England in Ye Old Days there was a trend for giving nicknames to animals. Thus, Jack Daw, Jenny Wren, and Robin Redbreast are now the names of birds in English. Now, we mostly call them “robins” and drop the “redbreast” most of the time.
* There may be a pleasing synergy with Robin Goodfellow, aka Puck and Hob Goblin, the Elvish mascot and primal spirit of England. But probably not intentional
* But basically Robin Hood, Robin Goodfellow, Robin from Batman, and American/European robins are all just named after that one guy. Robert. What a legend
Potoos use their body posture to camouflage themselves as part of the tree they’re perched in.
GUYS. LOOK IN THE SECOND PICTURE. LOOK AT THE FUZZY BABBY POTOO POSING LIKE ITS MOM. LOOK HOW PROUD SHE IS, LIKE “I’M SO GLAD, MY CHILD IS SO GOOD AT PRETENDING TO BE A FUCKING TREE STUMP”
I JUST THOUGHT YOU GUYS WOULD WANT TO KNOW WHAT A POTOO LOOKS LIKE WITH ITS EYES OPEN BECAUSE WOW
WOWOWOWOW
LIKE ALL AROUND THIS BIRD IS SO RIDICULOUS
NEW AVATAR
Okay, but it is also very important for everyone to understand what a potoo fucking sounds like, because they literally sound like a sixteen-year-old boy hollering at mom because she changed the wifi password.
so a few days ago i sat down for dinner and my mom handed me the camera with a strange look on her face. all she said was “you need to see this” and i was like ?? okay
but then
that is my dad with a pigeon on his head.
SO OF COURSE MY REACTION WAS JUST “WHAT?! HOW??? HOW” and APPARENTLY when my dad was outside gardening, he saw it land on the roof of our house. and then it just. flew down. and landed on his head
BUT NOW IT WON’T LEAVE
like the other morning i stepped outside to call my dad in for lunch and the pigeon was just sitting on the front porch watching him work
like seriously their brain-to-body size ratio is equal to that of a chimpanzee
They vocalize anger, sadness, or happiness in response to things
they are scary smart at solving puzzles
some crows stay with their mates until one of them dies
they can remember faces
SIDENOTE HERE BECAUSE HOLY SHIT. They did an experiment where these guys wore masks and some of them fucked with crows. Pretty soon the crows recognized the masks = douchebag. But the nice guys with masks they left alone. THEN, OH WE’RE NOT DONE, NO SIR crows that WEREN’T EVEN IN THE EXPERIMENT AND NEVER SAW THE MASK BEFORE knew about mask-dudes and attacked them on sight. THEY PASSED ON THE FUCKING INFORMATION TO THEIR CROW BUDDIES.
They remember places where crows were killed by farmers and change their migration patterns.
A colleague of my dad’s lives next to a lake, and looked out the window one morning to see a duck trapped in the ice. A crow swooped down. “Oh hell,” she thought, expecting carnage, because crows are opportunists. But the crow chipped at the ice with its beak until the duck was free.
Idk of this counts but a few crows saved me from a magpie swooping attack once ,they’re bros who can tell when magpies are being unreasonable and need to chill
I love crows so damn much. When I was fifteen, I hit a pretty serious bout of depression, to the point I was in my room for months. Well, a family of crows made a nest in a tree outside my window. There were two parents and two chicks. One chick was healthy and strong. One was weak, and had a caw like something being strained. It sounded more like a rooster crowing and so my parents jokingly named him ‘Buck’.Well… months passed and Buck’s sibling was taught to fly. His parents focused on the sibling because the sibling was strong. The father stayed behind to try and teach Buck, but I saw him try to fly, fail, and crash to the floor. His father helped him back up into the tree.
Every day, I would watch Buck from my window until one day I opened it and started talking to him. He was small and gangly and he couldn’t caw right. His feathers were all over the place and I felt a kinship. So I made a deal with him. I told him that if he could do it, if he could fly, then I could find the strength to get up. Well… near the end of the season, after talking with him every day, I finally saw him get out of the nest. He went to the edge of his branch, braced himself, and jumped… and just before he hit the ground, he soared back up into the sky. I cheered harder than I ever had before.
That winter, Buck left the area. I was crestfallen. I felt like I’d lost a friend. But I was so damn proud of him.
Cut to the next spring? I’m walking up the driveway one day when suddenly I hear a sound… a broken caw. I look up, and Buck is sitting in a tree above my head. He stared at me and puffed his feathers, then hopped down in front of me and cawed again. I was so damn thrilled, and I told him how proud I was of him. He ruffled his feathers and then soared off into his old tree.
That summer? I heard two broken caws. One from Buck… and one from his chick.
Cut to ten years later? We have a family of crows who all have a very distinct caw and they come here and spend every spring, summer, and fall on our property. Buck still greets me every spring.
that last reply made me wanna cry. that’s so beautiful.
