Science Articles

Posted by: Deepak Kumar

Did you know that parrots can be trained to say up to 200 words and short phrases? In fact their ability to mimic human language is so well known that many parrot owners initially purchase the bird for this reason alone.

The truth however is that like most talking birds they’re not really talking but mimicking the sounds they hear around them. They certainly don’t have any real understanding of the words they repeat and what’s more interesting is that parrots as a species are not the best of the bird mimickers.

Mynah Bird

Yes that’s right the top word mimic is actually the Mynah bird. Their ability to create amazingly realistic human and non-human sounds such as words, coughs, sneezes and even cell phone ring tones is well documented.

Other birds that are extremely intelligent and known to mimic human words are crows, ravens and jackdaws. Although their abilities are less publicized.