I liked the recording because I had never heard the song before. No magpies=
to my knowledge in Florida.
The comment about the ability of the magpie to imitate other birds was inte=
resting, but does not consider their overall ability. Many crows and ravens=
(other similar corvids) have been kept as pets; the birds often bond with =
their owner and will only speak around a person they trust (Bernd Heinrich)=
.
Considering that the birds can learn language, they are likely much more in=
telligent than most people suspect. Birds can learn language as has been do=
cumented through historical records. My own work with a parrot demonstrates=
that birds are capable of learning language. In my view, English is simply=
a second language for a speech-capable bird.
Bird sounds are foreign to most people. We have little knowledge about the =
precise meaning the utterances contain. I can state that due to parallel wi=
th a bird learning human language that wild bird must at the least have a p=
rotolanguage. Very difficult for most people to understand, because people =
have about a 2% receptivity for the freely-spoken English words for human l=
anguage spoken spontaneously by a bird.
Regards,
MikeFloridawww.ParrotSpeech.com/Another_Mind.html
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