OCR Text |
Show BIRDS WITH RARE TALENT. Many of Them Learn to Talk as Well as Imitate Others' Peculiar Motes. The parrot, the magpie and the raven ra-ven are not the only birds capable of learning human speech. In them the faculty of imitation is more highly developed de-veloped than among the other members mem-bers of the feathered world. There are a score of species that are able to Imitate sounds made by other animals. ani-mals. Bluejays, caught early and properly trained, can be taught to speak as well as most parrots, and the same thing can be accomplished with a crow if he is caught young and his tongue slit. M. H. Coupin, a well known naturalist, tells some curious stories regarding the imitative powers of certain birds which are generally supposed to lack such attainments. He tells of a sparrow which learned to imitate the strident noise made by a grasshopper. The cage containing the sparrow was hung during one spring next to a cage in which were grasshoppers. At that time the spar- rpw took no notice of the noises made by his neighbors, but the next spring when he found himself again in the company of grasshoppers, he seemed to consider that it was "up to him" to take part in their daily serenades. He made several attempts to sing af- ter the manner of his neighbors and was moderately successful. For the rest of h' life, long after the grasshoppers grass-hoppers were dead, h would every now and then give vent to his feelings feel-ings in a strain composed partly of the notes of the grasshoppers and partly of the notes of other birds. |