Friday Grey Matters
retrospectacle | January 2, 2008On December 30, the New York Times Magazine ran a feature about the most important obituaries of 2007. It was gratifying, yet still sad, to see that a joint obituatry for Alex the parrot and Washoe the chimp was included in the list. Alex and Washoe ("the Communicators," as described by the NYT) were both pioneering participants in the original animal "language" studies, which sought to test the limits of human-animal communication. Irene Pepperberg, trainer, colleague, and friend of Alex, continues her avian communication studies at Brandeis University, and if you would like to know more…
retrospectacle | September 21, 2007One of my favorite authors is Margaret Atwood, the Canadian sci-fi writer who has penned "The Handmaid's Tale," "The Robber Bride," and "Oryx and Crake." The first on that list is the book that initially hooked me, but I think "Oryx and Crake" holds a special place on my bookshelf for perhaps the silliest of reasons--it mentions a character who's obsessed with Alex the parrot. Naturally, I could relate.
Atwood's mention of Alex in her book made more sense to me when I met Irene Pepperberg, and she mentioned offhand that she was friends with Atwood. What at first seemed a coincidence was…
retrospectacle | September 10, 2007
Well, just heard that the necropsy of Alex was performed and that no discernible cause of death could be found. This is puzzling and sad, since it would have been better to have some sense of closure, but I suppose we may never know what killed Alex.
I was also sent the official obituary of Alex, written by Irene, which is under the fold.
RIP Alex.
In addition, Irene Pepperberg was be interviewed on NPR's "All Things Considered" today, check out the summary of the interview here. The audio of the interview will be at that link at 7pm Eastern Time.
8pm UPDATE: The audio link is now up!…
retrospectacle | September 8, 2007This is a repost from July of 2006. I thought it was appropriate, given Alex's passing. Please check out Friday Grey Matters in my archives for many more reports on Dr. Pepperberg's work with Alex.
Alex is a 28-year-old African Grey parrot who lives in the lab of Irene Pepperberg, in Brandeis University, and is the eqivalent of a superstar in the bird world. Long ago, Dr. Pepperberg chose Alex at a pet store as neither an exceptional nor sub-par bird. Through the years, Dr. Pepperberg has engaged Alex in a complex form of communication, where, much like a parent teaching a child, Alex is…
retrospectacle | September 8, 2007
On Friday, I received an email letting me know that the world's most famous African Grey, Alex, had passed away. For those of you who have read this blog for some amount of time, you probably realize that I was a huge fan of Irene Pepperberg's work with Alex and even dedicated a weekly series (Friday Grey Matters) to her work. Irene was also kind enough to allow me to interview her and to give a talk at the University of Michigan's Neuroscience Spring Symposia last May. She is truly a wonderful and extremely bright person, and I'm sure she is devastated. Alex was her companion and colleague…
retrospectacle | May 14, 2007 There's a nifty little radio show broadcast out of Canada called 'IAmAScientist' which focuses on [wait for it] the lives of scientists. The most recent show, cataloged via podcast courtesy of the friendly yet mysterious host, chats up Retrospectacle's favorite birdly scientist, Dr. Irene Pepperberg herself. Check it out here.
I also just noticed that the Canadian host says 'aboot.' Hehe. :)
Irene discusses at length her techniques and experiments with African Grey parrots and her most recent work on Muller-Lyer illusion perception in parrots. Even after spending a weekend with her, I…
retrospectacle | April 27, 2007 Last week I came across an interesting press release on a strange phenomenon: vocal 'naming' of parrot chicks by their mothers. At the time of that posting I hadn't come across the primary journal article, but a few commenters were kind enough to point me in the direction of this paper by Wanker et al, which described similar studies from the same lab in depth.
[Reference: Wanker et al. 2005. Vocal labeling of family members in spectacled parrotlets, Forpus conspicillatus. Animal Behavior. vol. 70 (1), pp. 111-118]
Parrots are highly social and intelligent animals who, although possessing…
retrospectacle | April 27, 2007 I have another post coming out later today for Friday Grey Matters, but I just had to put up a link to this amazing parrot-post at the Lounge of the Lab Lemming. In America, the nuts of the sweet gum tree are prickly, indestructible annoyances:
It was a family joke that they were so indestructible that after the sun burned out and blasted the Earth's atmosphere and biota to a crisp, the sweetgum balls would remain, the only biological object refactory enough to survive the inferno and bear testament to the former presence of life on the planet.
However, Australians have a bit different view…
retrospectacle | April 20, 2007 German researchers at the University of Hamburg claim to have documented that some parrots seem to give their offspring (but not their mates) individual "names," in the form of a distinctive call which is different for each of their chicks.
The studies were inspired by observations in the spectacled parrotlet's natural habitat in Colombia. There, researchers from Hamburg noted that individual parrots seemed to respond to specific calls that other parrots in the same flock ignored.
'A mother bird had the uncanny ability to utter a cry that would result in her chick returning to the nest…
retrospectacle | April 6, 2007 Busy week this week, I submitted a paper day before yesterday which is the first time I did it myself. The online submission system is really convienent! Anyway, for Friday Grey Matters, check out this amazing video of Alex the grey parrot in action with Dr. Irene Pepperberg. Its the third video down, since I can't embed the video unfortunately.
retrospectacle | March 30, 2007
The world's biggest flying parrot is the beautiful Hyacinth Macaw, a bluish-purple macaw with yellow around their eyes and mouth. I say "flying parrot" because the ground-bound Kakapo can sometimes weigh the same or a bit more. However, the Hyacinth also is perceived as bigger due to its extremely long tail feathers. Their beauty has been their saving grace and their curse, as the pet trade has taken a heavy toll on their numbers. Their natural habitat is Brazil, Bolivia, and Paraguay. However, they are now considered an endangered species and captive breeding programs in the US are trying…
retrospectacle | March 23, 2007 I'm going to take a bit of a departure for parrot-related news this week to focus on owls, which are solitary, nocturnal birds of prey. Recently a very rare species of owl, the long-whiskered owlet, was observed in the wild in Peru by an American ornithological team. The owlet, first discovered in 1976, is tiny, no bigger than a fist. The amber-eyed owl's facial feathers extend out past its head, making it appear to have wispy whiskers. It is also conjectured that the owl is nearly flightless
The American Bird Conservancy said the sighting "is considered a holy grail of South American…
retrospectacle | March 16, 2007It is not uncommon for a small population of exotic parrot species to flourish in a new niche in the United States. My old home in Sarasota, Florida had a large population of lories and Amazons which lived wild, making their homes in holes in palm trees in my neighborhood. Legend was that an tourist attraction aviary burned down in the 1960s, and the owner released all the parrots rather than see them killed. They stayed in the area, mated, and their numbers grew. A similar phenomenon happened in San Francisco in the area of Telegraph Hill, a neighborhood close to North Beach. A large…
retrospectacle | March 2, 2007 Mexico has a lot of problems on its hands: pollution, emigration, drugs, poverty, pollution, to name a few. But Mexico also plays host to many endangered species and habitats, providing a very dangerous home to the animals lucky enough to live there. And these endangered animals, including rare parrots, have price tags: what they can fetch at market.
At the Sonora Market, a bustling bazaar, traders illegally sell animals alongside exotic herbs and folk cures in the heart of Mexico City's often lawless center. Inside its labyrinthine corridors, conservationist Juan Carlos Cantu shudders as a…
retrospectacle | February 23, 2007According to the Bischof-Kohler hypothesis, only humans can dissociate themselves from their current motivation and take action for future needs: other animals are incapable of anticipating future needs, and any future-oriented behaviors they exhibit are either fixed action patterns or cued by their current motivational state. Well guess what, thats a lot of BS. According to a paper published in the most recent edition of Nature details that birds--scrub jays, in this study--genuinely plan ahead.
(Continued below the fold...)
Two requirements for planning are:
1. the behavior involves a novel…
retrospectacle | February 9, 2007 Dr. Irene Pepperberg has recently published an interesting paper in Language Sciences, regarding the ability of grey parrots to learn new words for unfamiliar objects using phonemes they already know. But, intuitively, the ability to create new words out of known phonemes would require that a parrot grasp that object labels are composed of individual parts which can be interchanged and applied to new objects. Do parrots really have that ability?
The answer may hinge on whether parrots engage in mimicry (mindlessly "parroting" back noise) or imitation (intentional copying of a novel act to…
retrospectacle | February 2, 2007A British woman is facing eviction from her apartment over the "persistent and serious noise nuisance and anti-social behaviour" of her African Grey parrot, Sparky. Apparently the bird is fond of saying "show me your knickers" and other raunchy phrases. (Continued under the fold...)
Hey baby, I'm a psychic parrot. And in the future I see your clothes on my floor.
She told The Press paper: "I feel like I'm being hounded out and that this is some sort of vendetta."
"I don't think Sparky is being a nuisance, but the officer told me they had received complaints about the noise."
She added: "I…
retrospectacle | January 19, 2007While reading a cute (but poorly-written) human interest piece on an African Grey named Valentine, something caught my eye. The author touched upon a particular behavior that Valentine was exhibiting: babbling.
Valentine is the color of an overcast day. His tail is scarlet. He recently started mumbling, whispering to himself, which means he'll be saying words and sentences soon.
People of all ages, from elderly women with permed hair to teens with attitudes and ripped clothes - all say the same thing: "Well, helllloooo. Aren't you a pretty bird? Helllloooo. Hello. Say 'hello.' "
Valentine…
retrospectacle | January 5, 2007I never knew there were such things as "orinithological quiz bowls," but apparently there are and the final question in one at Arizona State had to do with my favorite bird!
"Who is Alex?"
With the correct answer to that question, the team of Melissa Meadows, Matthew Toomey, and Bobby (Haralambos) Fokidis, all graduate students in the School of Life Sciences, won the inaugural quiz bowl at the fourth North American Ornithological Conference, held in Veracruz, Mexico.
The conference was the largest ornithological meeting in history and was attended by scientists from across the Americas.…
retrospectacle | December 8, 2006
Well, its been a long time coming, and further delayed by grants, labwork, and Irene's hand injury. But, Irene and I finally got on the phone last weekend and chatted a bit about her work, her birds, and her uncertain future in the field. Irene Pepperberg is someone who I've admired since early undergrad, and she's been a bit of a role model for me. During grad school interviews, I tried to track her down and interview with her at the University of Arizona (who lied and told me she was there, despite her moving to MIT). I would have loved to have worked with her, although now I realize that…