Showing posts with label birds. Show all posts
Showing posts with label birds. Show all posts
Friday, March 28, 2008
Tuesday, December 18, 2007
Tiny, harmless bird terrorizes senate press room
A bird gets loose in the Senate Press gallery, and a chase with nets and granola crumbs ensues. CNN's Jeanne Moos reports(bird in the senate? Get it? I think I'm funny.)
"Journalist" Jeanne Moos might make this video nearly unwatchable, but the reactions of the press critters are priceless. My favorite part is when one of them gets pooped on, but it's okay because "he's a bald guy."
Bonus: footage of bison breaking into a tennis court. >>
Sunday, October 21, 2007
Dancing Cockatoos: Overanalyzing YouTube Nonsense
There may not be any animals fighting here, but why pigeonhole ourselves? Besides, it's a beautiful Sunday, it's your fault you're on the internet.
According to youtube, cockatoos love to dance. There are days when it seems like every other video is a cockatoo boogying its face off, and damn if I couldn't spend hours watching them do that. It's an awful shame they're usually dancing to the Backstreet boys or something similarly terrible, but then again the sorts of people who make pet birds dance might not have the best taste in music.
Wait! Who's that, lurking in the shadows? It looks like... oh no! It's Wired Magazine, coming to ruin our fun! Curse you wired, with your reasoned, objective analysis!
I suspect that in most cases, while the video is being shot, but outside the picture, the bird's owner is dancing along with the bird, and encouraging it. Being very social, interactive, and intelligent, they also quickly notice what kind of behavior gets them attention and repeat it. So it would be easy to train a cockatoo to dance without ever consciously trying to.
While it doesn't seem that there's a bulletproof conclusion, it looks like cockatoos might not actually be genetically endowed with wicked flow. This should be the sort or thing that could be solved with a cockatoo, the scientific method and a Backstreet Boys CD, but by the time they throw all that through an IRB I don't think anyone will care anymore. Alas! Here are some more videos if you'd like.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VCm0kn-Mbdo This one actually has some great music that I took the time to look for afterwards.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MjFAbsGconY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WQT6noaH0qo >>
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)