Humans are so cute. They think they can outsmart birds. They place nasty metal spikes on rooftops and ledges to prevent birds from nesting there.
It’s a classic human trick known in urban design as “evil architecture”: designing a place in a way that’s meant to deter others. Think of the city benches you see segmented by bars to stop homeless people sleeping there.
But birds are genius rebels. Not only are they undeterred by evil architecture, they actually use it to their advantage, according to a new Dutch study published in the journal Deinsea.
Crows and magpies, it turns out, are learning to rip strips of anti-bird spikes off of buildings and use them to build their nests. It’s an incredible addition to the growing body of evidence about the intelligence of birds, so wrongly maligned as stupid that “bird-brained” is still commonly used as an insult...
Magpies also use anti-bird spikes for their nests. In 2021, a hospital patient in Antwerp, Belgium, looked out the window and noticed a huge magpie’s nest in a tree in the courtyard. Biologist Auke-Florian Hiemstra of Leiden-based Naturalis Biodiversity Center, one of the study’s authors, went to collect the nest and found that it was made out of 50 meters of anti-bird strips, containing no fewer than 1,500 metal spikes.
Hiemstra describes the magpie nest as “an impregnable fortress.”
Pictured: A huge magpie nest made out of 1,500 metal spikes.
Magpies are known to build roofs over their nests to prevent other birds from stealing their eggs and young. Usually, they scrounge around in nature for thorny plants or spiky branches to form the roof. But city birds don’t need to search for the perfect branch — they can just use the anti-bird spikes that humans have so kindly put at their disposal.
“The magpies appear to be using the pins exactly the same way we do: to keep other birds away from their nest,” Hiemstra said.
Another urban magpie nest, this one from Scotland, really shows off the roof-building tactic:
Pictured: A nest from Scotland shows how urban magpies are using anti-bird spikes to construct a roof meant to protect their young and eggs from predators.
Birds had already been spotted using upward-pointing anti-bird spikes as foundations for nests. In 2016, the so-called Parkdale Pigeon became Twitter-famous for refusing to give up when humans removed her first nest and installed spikes on her chosen nesting site, the top of an LCD monitor on a subway platform in Melbourne. The avian architect rebelled and built an even better home there, using the spikes as a foundation to hold her nest more securely in place.
...Hiemstra’s study is the first to show that birds, adapting to city life, are learning to seek out and use our anti-bird spikes as their nesting material. Pretty badass, right?
The genius of birds — and other animals we underestimate
It’s a well-established fact that many bird species are highly intelligent. Members of the corvid family, which includes crows and magpies, are especially renowned for their smarts. Crows can solve complex puzzles, while magpies can pass the “mirror test” — the classic test that scientists use to determine if a species is self-aware.
Studies show that some birds have evolved cognitive skills similar to our own: They have amazing memories, remembering for months the thousands of different hiding places where they’ve stashed seeds, and they use their own experiences to predict the behavior of other birds, suggesting they’ve got some theory of mind.
And, as author Jennifer Ackerman details in The Genius of Birds, birds are brilliant at using tools. Black palm cockatoos use twigs as drumsticks, tapping out a beat on a tree trunk to get a female’s attention. Jays use sticks as spears to attack other birds...
Birds have also been known to use human tools to their advantage. When carrion crows want to crack a walnut, for example, they position the nut on a busy road, wait for a passing car to crush the shell, then swoop down to collect the nut and eat it. This behavior has been recorded several times in Japanese crows.
But what’s unique about Hiemstra’s study is that it shows birds using human tools, specifically designed to thwart birds’ plans, in order to thwart our plans instead. We humans try to keep birds away with spikes, and the birds — ingenious rebels that they are — retort: Thanks, humans!
-via Vox, July 26, 2023
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Heavenly Father,
We come before you today with hearts full of gratitude and hope. We lift up our Tumblr community to you, knowing that you are a God who sees each one individually and knows their needs. We ask for your guidance and provision in their lives, no matter where they find themselves. Whether in moments of joy or struggle, may they feel your presence.
Lord, grant them wisdom and strength as they navigate life's challenges. May they be surrounded by supportive and loving relationships that uplift and encourage them. Help them to walk in confidence, knowing that you have a plan and a purpose for each of them, designed for their good.
We pray for success in their endeavors, peace in their hearts, and joy in their daily lives. May they find fulfillment in their passions and discover new avenues of growth and learning. Lord, grant them resilience to overcome obstacles and courage to pursue their dreams.
In all circumstances, let them know that they are never alone, for you are with them every step of the way. Your love never fails, and your mercies are new every morning.
We ask all these things in the name of Jesus Christ, our Savior and Redeemer. Amen.
Hope Through Scripture
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Love them where they are. If someone is falling behind in life, you don't have to remind them. They already know. If someone is unhealthy, they know. If someone is struggling with relationships, with money, with self image... they know. It's what consumes their thoughts each day. What you need to do for those who are in that place is not to reprimand, but to encourage. To tell them what's good about their lives, to show them the potential within them that you see. What you need to do, is love them where they are. When we can't see clearly for ourselves, we need others to speak greatness over us. People don't need you to tell them what's wrong with their lives - they already know. They need you to reassure them that they can still make it right.
Everything grows and changes when it is loved well — people included.
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I just turned 21!!! and it got me thinking, how would the guys celebrate their 21st? Got any headcanons for us, Miss Nightshade?
Oh shit how long has it been since you sent this...? Timestamps aren't a thing lmao, sorry. And congratulations! :D
Of course the boys would wanna try alcohol! They've been waiting their whole lives for this moment!!
Raph goes first and foremost for the hard liquor like gin and rum
gotta prove he's a MAN amirite??
then he smells the fruity drinks Mikey and Don are sharing and changes his mind
can't be that bad if TWO of his bros are drinking it, right?!
Leo tries to keep sophisticated about it and totally puts on airs lmao
"I'll drink the sake one sip at a time like you're supposed to"
also tries to keep his bros under some measure of control
it does not last
Mikey just starts chugging the drinks he's always wanted to try
and also spits out any of them he doesn't like just all over the table
Donnie's the smart one, making sure he stays hydrated between drinks and imbibes slowly while keeping active notes of how drunk he's feeling after each one so he can figure out his tolerance level
soon Mikey and Raph are hanging on each other and singing along with whatever music is on the stereo, probably loudly and off-tune
it annoys Leo a lot but he can't say anything cause baby bro Mikey looks so h a p p y
Donnie suggests they play arcade games as they get progressively drunker
Leo eventually gives up on propriety and chugs an entire bottle of wine which he fails to remember doing
Donnie starts filming shit at that point while chortling all the while
he thinks he's more sober than he is and keeps trying to narrate and thinks he's holding the camera steady but NOPE
Mikey strangely holds his liquor the best, but he also drank the hardest so he's still the first to blackout
Raph and Leo devolve to chanting drinking rhymes and doing complex patty-cake games in an attempt to out-sober each other
Donnie is now mumbling and slurring everything he says but he still thinks he's being perfectly coherent
Mikey intermittently gets up, talks to himself, yells at the TV, has another drink, etc, then blacks out again
usually he's staring at the neon signs when it happens with his mouth open like
like he's just lost in how pretty lights are, like bros, bros, hey bros, do you -- do you see how -- how pretty lights are??
keeps passing out and waking up and he falls into the canal like seven times
Leo and Raph have devolved further into arguing with each other but at the same time are having two completely different conversations with each other
Raph's talking about monster trucks and Leo's talking about Mozart
they both think the other is responding to their subject
somehow Donnie ended up filming the ground and mumbling about the cracks in the concrete and the tiny microscopic civilizations living inside them like tiny worlds all of their own
do you think there's tardigrades down there??
next morning Mikey is facedown on the floor in a puddle of drool
Donnie is slumped over in a chair, snoring louder than he's ever snored
Raph made it to the bunk beds but fell asleep in Mikey's
Leo's in the dump truck and has no idea why or how he got there
they all slowly rouse while Splinter goes about making hangover remedies
they crawl to the kitchen one by one, and when they're all there and staring at each other with dry, sunken eyes, they simultaneously just go
"...That was AWESOME"
and thus did getting blackout drunk become a yearly birthday tradition
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