FARK.com: (7044395) Wild parrots are learning English from escaped pet birds, though the Norwegian Blue remains strangely mute on the subject

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		Wild parrots are learning English from escaped pet birds, though the Norwegian Blue remains strangely mute on the subject (outsideonline.com)		82
		More: Misc, parrot sketch, English, shuttle

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6313 clicks; posted to Main » on 11 Apr 2012 at 2:44 PM | Favorite | share:

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TsarTom		2012-04-11 11:20:10 AM

uh oh

Somacandra		2012-04-11 11:28:05 AM

MaudlinMutantMollusk		2012-04-11 11:44:23 AM

That reminds me of a comedy skit I saw once

/don't remember where
//but I find myself pining for the fjords

toraque		2012-04-11 12:28:52 PM

Well, obviously parrots don't speak when they're sleeping!

alwaysjaded		2012-04-11 12:40:20 PM

Somacandra: [i.imgur.com image 450x339]

Homer: *shudders* Babies.

the_sidewinder		2012-04-11 01:14:07 PM

Lovely plumage

xanadian		2012-04-11 02:07:18 PM

What an in-depth and informative article.

Osomatic		2012-04-11 02:37:15 PM

the_sidewinder: Lovely plumage

The plumage don't enter into it!

MoronLessOff		2012-04-11 02:47:16 PM

But they'll never talk about politics or religion.

deeproy		2012-04-11 02:48:25 PM

Hypothetical Imperative		2012-04-11 02:48:49 PM

MaudlinMutantMollusk: That reminds me of a comedy skit I saw once

/don't remember where
//but I find myself pining for the fjords

Pretty sure it was The Kids in the Hall. Something about squishing heads, I think.

BurnShrike		2012-04-11 02:49:50 PM

Escaped pet parrots in Australia are teaching wild birds English

When are they going to teach it to the Australians?

Gyrfalcon		2012-04-11 02:50:51 PM

BurnShrike: Escaped pet parrots in Australia are teaching wild birds English

When are they going to teach it to the Australians?

And now for something completely different.

Sum Guye		2012-04-11 02:51:26 PM

Frantic City, Frantic City [squawk, whistle].

fruitloop		2012-04-11 02:51:50 PM

In case of an earthquake get in a doorway.

/attell
//roll her up in the carpet
///thank you, parrot

Precocious Periwinkle Pastrygirl		2012-04-11 02:52:48 PM

Do the birds have Australian accents? Can birds learn different accents?

FirstDennis		2012-04-11 02:53:25 PM

Clearly a gov't plot gone wrong.

i42.tinypic.com

mark12A		2012-04-11 02:54:12 PM

Just because some watery tart throws a thesaurus at you doesn't make you an english major....

Evil Kirk vs Bad Ash		2012-04-11 02:55:47 PM

Mikey1969		2012-04-11 02:56:05 PM

We had escaped parrots flying around in the town I went to high school in down in Arizona. They all tended to hang out together, and everyone knew whose birds they had been, but nobody ever tried to recapture them for some reason. Maybe they earned their freedom?

Stile4aly		2012-04-11 02:57:04 PM

How will these birds survive in the wild now that they're accustomed to a diet of Venezuelan beaver cheese?

ivan		2012-04-11 02:59:40 PM

He's shuffled off his mortal coil, rung down the curtain and joined the choir invisible.

booger42		2012-04-11 02:59:56 PM

The palendrome of Bolton is Notlob!

Hypothetical Imperative		2012-04-11 03:01:09 PM

Precocious Periwinkle Pastrygirl: Do the birds have Australian accents? Can birds learn different accents?

Yes. It doesn't come across quite the same (because of course birds are mimicking the sound, not speaking the words) but yeah, they'll pick up accents. Had a friend once with a parrot that picked up a bunch of phrases from it's former British owner. After a few years it would sort of alternate between the Queen's English and my friends horrifically bad Bronx American.

It was sort of like having Andrew Dice Clay over for tea.

Girl_Friday_19		2012-04-11 03:03:34 PM

Hypothetical Imperative: MaudlinMutantMollusk: That reminds me of a comedy skit I saw once

/don't remember where
//but I find myself pining for the fjords

Pretty sure it was The Kids in the Hall. Something about squishing heads, I think.

Kids in the hall! What kind of talk is that?!

/I am now tired and shagged out after that prolonged skwak

Sofa King Smart		2012-04-11 03:04:16 PM

so is this going to be like the movie 'Rise'... except with birds?

/ ex-parrot

Smeggy Smurf		2012-04-11 03:04:29 PM

Has anybody else wanted to teach parrots everything George Carlin ever ranted about and then donate the birds to churches everywhere?

cgraves67		2012-04-11 03:05:21 PM

Precocious Periwinkle Pastrygirl: Do the birds have Australian accents? Can birds learn different accents?

It will be interesting to see in a few bird generations if the wild birds develop a new accent.

chookbillion		2012-04-11 03:05:21 PM

I had a few pet budgies when I was a kid, and I saw plenty of caged cokatoos here and there. People would selI them for $20. I feel bad about it now. They really should have been left in the wild instead of locked in a cage and neglected. What rotten luck to be captured.

WalMartian		2012-04-11 03:12:52 PM

Precocious Periwinkle Pastrygirl: Do the birds have Australian accents? Can birds learn different accents?

My brother-in-law inherited his grandfather's parrot who spoke German.

Need_MindBleach		2012-04-11 03:21:45 PM

cgraves67: Precocious Periwinkle Pastrygirl: Do the birds have Australian accents? Can birds learn different accents?

It will be interesting to see in a few bird generations if the wild birds develop a new accent.

Ooh, linguistics! No, I think they'd have to be having actual conversations for that to happen, not just repeating words and phrases. To birds, (most of the time) they're just repeating what they think are calls humans make, and adopting those calls as their own.

Glendale		2012-04-11 03:24:51 PM

Alex the African grey parrot would have liked to have a word with you.

32oz High Life		2012-04-11 03:25:40 PM

I get it.

It's a Dr. Who joke.

Osomatic		2012-04-11 03:26:53 PM

Now the birds just shrug, squawk, and say "It's a living!"

DedParrot		2012-04-11 03:30:23 PM

cgraves67		2012-04-11 03:30:40 PM

Need_MindBleach: cgraves67: Precocious Periwinkle Pastrygirl: Do the birds have Australian accents? Can birds learn different accents?

It will be interesting to see in a few bird generations if the wild birds develop a new accent.

Ooh, linguistics! No, I think they'd have to be having actual conversations for that to happen, not just repeating words and phrases. To birds, (most of the time) they're just repeating what they think are calls humans make, and adopting those calls as their own.

To my mind having the sounds without meanings would make the accent drift even faster than if the birds attributed meanings to them.

Gyrfalcon		2012-04-11 03:33:24 PM

Sofa King Smart: so is this going to be like the movie 'Rise'... except with birds?

/ ex-parrot

It's going to be like "The Birds" only with parrots.

ByOwlLight		2012-04-11 03:33:59 PM

Need_MindBleach: Ooh, linguistics! No, I think they'd have to be having actual conversations for that to happen, not just repeating words and phrases. To birds, (most of the time) they're just repeating what they think are calls humans make, and adopting those calls as their own.

African Greys have been proven to actually understand and speak words. The best example I can think of right now is that Alex, the super famous one, really, really liked almonds, but they didn't teach him the word for them. So he went and invented his own word, and one day asked if he could have some "corknuts," since they kind of look like corks when in the shell.

I don't know about other species, but smart African Greys at least are doing more than just mimicking.

Need_MindBleach		2012-04-11 03:35:48 PM

cgraves67: Need_MindBleach: cgraves67: Precocious Periwinkle Pastrygirl: Do the birds have Australian accents? Can birds learn different accents?

It will be interesting to see in a few bird generations if the wild birds develop a new accent.

Ooh, linguistics! No, I think they'd have to be having actual conversations for that to happen, not just repeating words and phrases. To birds, (most of the time) they're just repeating what they think are calls humans make, and adopting those calls as their own.

To my mind having the sounds without meanings would make the accent drift even faster than if the birds attributed meanings to them.

Well I don't know. Do parrots in different areas squawk differently? If one group of parrots is separated from the others, will their natural calls change over time?

Need_MindBleach		2012-04-11 03:41:24 PM

ByOwlLight: Need_MindBleach: Ooh, linguistics! No, I think they'd have to be having actual conversations for that to happen, not just repeating words and phrases. To birds, (most of the time) they're just repeating what they think are calls humans make, and adopting those calls as their own.

African Greys have been proven to actually understand and speak words. The best example I can think of right now is that Alex, the super famous one, really, really liked almonds, but they didn't teach him the word for them. So he went and invented his own word, and one day asked if he could have some "corknuts," since they kind of look like corks when in the shell.

I don't know about other species, but smart African Greys at least are doing more than just mimicking.

True, but they still can't actually speak a language. You can do the same thing with border collies, it's just that the collies can't speak back. You can teach several smart animal species quite a few words, and they do understand the meanings, but they can't form sentences or re-arrange the words to have a different meaning. Only humans have that particular capability, and it's probably the biggest difference between humans and non-human animals.

Flakeloaf		2012-04-11 03:41:44 PM

Need_MindBleach: cgraves67: Need_MindBleach: cgraves67: Precocious Periwinkle Pastrygirl: Do the birds have Australian accents? Can birds learn different accents?

It will be interesting to see in a few bird generations if the wild birds develop a new accent.

Ooh, linguistics! No, I think they'd have to be having actual conversations for that to happen, not just repeating words and phrases. To birds, (most of the time) they're just repeating what they think are calls humans make, and adopting those calls as their own.

To my mind having the sounds without meanings would make the accent drift even faster than if the birds attributed meanings to them.

Well I don't know. Do parrots in different areas squawk differently? If one group of parrots is separated from the others, will their natural calls change over time?

Short answer yes.

The Beatings Will Continue Until Morale Improves		2012-04-11 03:47:41 PM

He's resting!

ByOwlLight		2012-04-11 03:50:59 PM

Need_MindBleach: but they can't form sentences or re-arrange the words to have a different meaning.

...except that that example proves that they can, since Alex combined cork and nut to make a new word. Another African Grey, N'Kisi, asked Jane Goodall "Got a chimp?" when he met her, because he'd seen pictures of her in Africa. He wasn't trained to do that.

And since you brought in other animals, I'll also mention the hilarious example of Koko the gorilla calling people stuff like "dirty toilet devil" when she was mad at them. She effectively created her own swear words by comboing things.

So, no, the average parrot out there isn't going to bump around, speaking English like a pro, and it's not like some English parrot dialect is going to evolve. But the assumption that animals can't speak languages or manipulate words/sentences to fit their meanings is kind of wrong.

LostInTO		2012-04-11 03:53:15 PM

Sum Guye: [vicmackey.trakt.tv image 400x300]

Frantic City, Frantic City [squawk, whistle].
Doctor's a plummer, Doctor's a plummer.

I loved that espisode.

LostInTO		2012-04-11 03:55:32 PM

Ok, got to excited.

plumber not plummer.

whither_apophis		2012-04-11 03:59:28 PM

BurnShrike: Escaped pet parrots in Australia are teaching wild birds English

When are they going to teach it to the Australians?

Great a bunch of parrots all squawking "Hello Bruce!"

This is a late parrot		2012-04-11 04:15:00 PM

DedParrot: [home.comcast.net image 250x327]

Ha Ha. Very Funny

Wardrobe_Malfunction		2012-04-11 05:01:38 PM

Terrible link, subby.

Follow the trail of breadcrumbs to get to the far better ORIGINAL ARTICLE .(new window)

dericwater		2012-04-11 05:04:40 PM

ByOwlLight: Need_MindBleach: Ooh, linguistics! No, I think they'd have to be having actual conversations for that to happen, not just repeating words and phrases. To birds, (most of the time) they're just repeating what they think are calls humans make, and adopting those calls as their own.

African Greys have been proven to actually understand and speak words. The best example I can think of right now is that Alex, the super famous one, really, really liked almonds, but they didn't teach him the word for them. So he went and invented his own word, and one day asked if he could have some "corknuts," since they kind of look like corks when in the shell.

I don't know about other species, but smart African Greys at least are doing more than just mimicking.

I wonder if an African Grey taught in french would produce the french equivalent to "nutscork"

ladyfortuna		2012-04-11 05:20:17 PM

Need_MindBleach: ByOwlLight: Need_MindBleach:
True, but they still can't actually speak a language. You can do the same thing with border collies, it's just that the collies can't speak back. You can teach several smart animal species quite a few words, and they do understand the meanings, but they can't form sentences or re-arrange the words to have a different meaning. Only humans have that particular capability, and it's probably the biggest difference between humans and non-human animals.

I've read on various Cracked articles and Wikipedia that ravens and crows in particular are actually way smarter than humans thought even a decade ago - don't remember specifics but something about using tools, 'bird' language, and teaching their descendents that certain people are EVIL AND MUST BE ATTACKED. It's really remarkable, and considering researchers recently found that Octopuses also use tools and build homes, I wouldn't be surprised if many animals turn out to be smarter than previously thought.

So you know, smarter than a 5th grader or something ^_~

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