12 ms·

Squirrels listen in to birds' conversations as signal of safety

143 points by lelf 7y ago

thefz 7y ago
Might it be that birds just fly away immediately in the presence of a predator and for the same reason we humans find the sound of birds chirping so relaxing?
- gshdg 7y ago
  Seems like most of the predators that are dangerous to birds are also dangerous to squirrels but not to humans. Cats, falcons, foxes...
- mongol 7y ago
  It is not always the case, it is not unusual that they change the way they sound. "Bird chirping" can roughly be divided into bird song and bird calls. Bird songs are for the most part relaxing, while bird calls are often used for warning purposes. Bird watchers learn to look out when the birds in an area change from the first to the latter. For example, I once looked around in this circumstance and soon saw an owl with a dead bird in its claws. I am not surprised that other animals, such as squirrels, learn to make the association too.
  - grawprog 7y ago
    To add to this, songbirds also sometimes engange in mobbing when predators show up. Different species will all flock together and bombard the predator. I've watched it happen to my cat before when he was chasing chickadees around. All the birds in the yard ganged up on him and chased him off. He's not a very good hunter, so the birds weren't really in danger either way. One of my biology teachers mentioned if you make the right noises while walking through the forest, you can trick the song birds into thinking you're a predator and see the phenomenon for yourself.
uberdru 7y ago
Another study to file under "No Shit, Sherlock".
- ChuckMcM 7y ago
  And yet, had someone just stated "Squirrels listen to bird songs and relate that to their relative safety." You might dismiss that with "Sounds plausible but you can't really know that can you? Maybe they just like birds." "Doing the science" is something that while sometimes seems like you're testing an obviously true hypothesis does two things, one it gives you confidence in asserting something is true (hypothesis proven), two it unlocks additional structure that was unknown (hypothesis fails randomly indicating a confounding factor).
  - davnicwil 7y ago
    > hypothesis proven I broadly agree with you but just want to flag up that there is subtlety here that's important. The scientific method is really more focused on disproving hypotheses than proving them. The goal isn't to prove your model describes exactly what is happening. You actually assume it doesn't, but is good enough as far as you know for practical purposes, for now. Trying to refute aspects the model sort of provides evidence that it isn't obviously incorrect, so in a sense you are supporting the hypothesis by not disproving it, but the goal really is ultimitely to refute it and then refine the model accordingly so it becomes better over time. You're never 'done' - the model/hypothesis is never 'proven'. It's a subtle distinction, but an important one.
  - Gravityloss 7y ago
    I assume the grandparent had the opposite point: that it's obvious to anyone who's spent any time with birds around that everybody tends to notice the alerts they make. Other birds, humans, pets, wild animals.
  - oh_sigh 7y ago
    This has been known by outdoors people for literally centuries, probably millenia, because disturbing birds can ruin your hunt. I was just browsing this[1] book on my bookshelf where it is talked about extensively, and it is far beyond just a statement of fact. [1] https://www.amazon.co.uk/Walkers-Guide-Outdoor-Clues-Signs-ebook/dp/B00H4EPBWM https://www.amazon.co.uk/Walkers-Guide-Outdoor-Clues-Signs-e...
timwis 7y ago
The graphic at the top of the article with the thought bubble is just fantastic
- a-wu 7y ago
  Reminds me of this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ouwtdH2zt9s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ouwtdH2zt9s
- mellosouls 7y ago
  I like that it's helpfully titled "Listening grey squirrel" just in case there was any remaining doubt of the subject.
totally 7y ago
Excellent book on this topic: https://www.amazon.com/What-Robin-Knows-Secrets-Natural/dp/054400230X/ https://www.amazon.com/What-Robin-Knows-Secrets-Natural/dp/0...
newsreview1 7y ago
We have chickens, and they do the same thing. They listen for cues from other species, and rightly so. We have an adopted (just showed up one day) guinea hen who has a jungle type squawk she makes whenever a predator, including a local sharp-shinned hawk is present. When she pipes up, everyone takes cover. Ironically, when she makes the noise, our barn cats look to start hunting/ crouching. They are fantastic predators.
jhallenworld 7y ago
But do cats make that chattering sound to lure birds with a false sense of safety? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=plPcu0Le1Ts https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=plPcu0Le1Ts
gaoshan 7y ago
Other birds do as well. They all pay attention to each other. I have a very active set of bird feeders in a rural area (so many species of birds and other animals use them at the same time). I am within sight to it for much of the day and it's very clear that they all cue off of each other. Some are more brave, others more timid but they all pay attention. A chipmunk or bird fight won't phase the others but a cat (or person or hawk overhead) will cause the birds to make what is, for some of them, a very clearly different call (usually loud and abrupt) and they all react at the same time.
- mkr-hn 7y ago
  I've watched birds land in front of me, turn their backs to me, and keep looking back. I wonder if they were assessing me as a potential threat for other birds. They do seem to let me get closer now.
rossdavidh 7y ago
We have a bird feeder, which squirrels cannot (usually) get to but they hang out nearby to eat what falls out. We also have the occasional feral cat or two that swing by. I can attest that they are all listening to each other sound the alarm, so it makes sense they would also listen to the "all clear". My wife also does, because if they sound the alarm that means a cat is nearby, and she comes over to the window to see if she can see the cat. This may have caused me to pay more attention to the whole interaction.
- hokumguru 7y ago
  What bird feeder? Because every one I've ever tried has been promptly ransacked by squirrels immediately after filling it.
  - rossdavidh 7y ago
    Sorry, didn't see the reply until now. I have a nothing special bird-feeder, but two things make it harder for squirrels to get to: 1) it is suspended, from high above, by a rope around a tree branch; it is high enough that they cannot jump up to it from below (well, it is high enough now, anyway, since I saw them doing that) 2) just above the bird feeder is a dome, with a hole in the center, through which the rope passes. There is a stick which the rope is tied around, which keeps the dome just above the bird feeder. If the squirrel climbs down the rope from above, the dome keeps them from getting to the bird feeder.
causality0 7y ago
Fascinating. This particular behavior is somewhat widely known but it does serve as a hint that there are depths of animal behavior we haven't yet perceived. Billions of years of evolution have created fantastically complex interactive systems on the microscopic level, but we sometimes forget it's had just as much time to work on animal behaviors as it has their physical makeup. I suspect there's many more surprising things to find.
mellosouls 7y ago
Off topic, this does raise the question of who we listen to to not be terrorised by squirrels. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-45150298 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-45150298 (Sorry mods)
forgotmypw 7y ago
Over 100 years ago, in Wild Animals I Have Known (1898), Ernest Thompson Seton describes this behavior in rabbits. One of my favorite books.
- tomlogic 7y ago
  I saw this in house rabbits allowed to roam the backyard supervised. When the crows alerted to raptors in the area, the rabbits would get low and head for cover.
- jacobwilliamroy 7y ago
  "though the bluejay often tells lies for mischief you are safe to believe him when he brings ill news." It is my favorite book. :D
m463 7y ago
It works in reverse. I remember reading ravens and wolves cooperate to hunt. The crows alert the wolves to prey, the wolves take care of it, then the crows share the spoils afterwards.
- ldh 7y ago
  Sounds like what I learned from Ravens in Winter (https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/122665.Ravens_in_Winter https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/122665.Ravens_in_Winter) an excellent read.
technothrasher 7y ago
While in Africa on Safari, it quickly became clear that everything was listening to everything else, including us. It didn't take long to understand the various alert calls and use them to find big predators to shoot (with a camera!)
h2odragon 7y ago
I suspect the most distracted, hormonally frenzied squirrel is more aware of his environment and present in his moment than the majority of humans can achieve with concentrated effort. Go sit in a forest clearing and be still and quiet long enough for everything to decide you're staying and work around you. That place on that day will have a story of more detail, drama and character than any soap opera could hope to get. Tomorrow there'll be another epic there. The next clearing over has a different show.
- lkschubert8 7y ago
  Isn't that just by nature of the fact that the squirrel lives in an environment in which he has to actively search for food when he's hungry and one that has other entities actively trying to kill it?
  - jdavis703 7y ago
    This is correct. When I'm riding my bike it's easy to stay in the moment. I have to be alert for busted infrastructure, innatentive drivers, impulsive first responders and all manner of other threats. If I'm driving a car it's mostly boring. I have to actively work to keep my mind on task. I suspect others are like me, and that's why distracted driving is such a big problem.
- scarejunba 7y ago
  Yeah, that's part of why we're better. We've got better filters. Think about all those poor people with mental disorders that don't allow them to auto-filter. Discriminatory power is gold. Subconscious discrimination is a superpower.
  - jdavis703 7y ago
    As someone with an "auto filter mental disorder" I have to work very hard to read this post charitably. I know this is the internet and written text is hard, but it would be easy to perceive this post as "othering" folks with metal illness. I don't think that was your intent, so that's why I'm writing this.
hownottowrite 7y ago
In the birding world there's a thing called pishing. If you get it right you're basically alerting them to predators in the area and they come by to see what's up (and potentially mob the predator if need be). Great for taking pics. [1] https://www.thespruce.com/pishing-to-attract-birds-386698 https://www.thespruce.com/pishing-to-attract-birds-386698
jhow15 7y ago
I’m always surprised how, in my experience at least, people with less exposure to animals usually underestimate their ability to understand their surroundings and even feel emotions.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
lngnmn1 7y ago
Birds have no conversations. They have songs and calls or cries. Frequencies instead of syntax or semantics. This is how music differs from a language. "Science" nowadays cannot even follow basic logic and categories.
instagraham 7y ago
Why are they so distracted, paranoid, and cute? Squirrels are truly my spirit animal

143 points by lelf 7y ago

Might it be that birds just fly away immediately in the presence of a predator and for the same reason we humans find the sound of birds chirping so relaxing?

gshdg 7y ago
Seems like most of the predators that are dangerous to birds are also dangerous to squirrels but not to humans. Cats, falcons, foxes...
mongol 7y ago
It is not always the case, it is not unusual that they change the way they sound. "Bird chirping" can roughly be divided into bird song and bird calls. Bird songs are for the most part relaxing, while bird calls are often used for warning purposes. Bird watchers learn to look out when the birds in an area change from the first to the latter. For example, I once looked around in this circumstance and soon saw an owl with a dead bird in its claws. I am not surprised that other animals, such as squirrels, learn to make the association too.
- grawprog 7y ago
  To add to this, songbirds also sometimes engange in mobbing when predators show up. Different species will all flock together and bombard the predator. I've watched it happen to my cat before when he was chasing chickadees around. All the birds in the yard ganged up on him and chased him off. He's not a very good hunter, so the birds weren't really in danger either way. One of my biology teachers mentioned if you make the right noises while walking through the forest, you can trick the song birds into thinking you're a predator and see the phenomenon for yourself.

uberdru 7y ago

Another study to file under "No Shit, Sherlock".

ChuckMcM 7y ago
And yet, had someone just stated "Squirrels listen to bird songs and relate that to their relative safety." You might dismiss that with "Sounds plausible but you can't really know that can you? Maybe they just like birds." "Doing the science" is something that while sometimes seems like you're testing an obviously true hypothesis does two things, one it gives you confidence in asserting something is true (hypothesis proven), two it unlocks additional structure that was unknown (hypothesis fails randomly indicating a confounding factor).
- davnicwil 7y ago
  > hypothesis proven I broadly agree with you but just want to flag up that there is subtlety here that's important. The scientific method is really more focused on disproving hypotheses than proving them. The goal isn't to prove your model describes exactly what is happening. You actually assume it doesn't, but is good enough as far as you know for practical purposes, for now. Trying to refute aspects the model sort of provides evidence that it isn't obviously incorrect, so in a sense you are supporting the hypothesis by not disproving it, but the goal really is ultimitely to refute it and then refine the model accordingly so it becomes better over time. You're never 'done' - the model/hypothesis is never 'proven'. It's a subtle distinction, but an important one.
- Gravityloss 7y ago
  I assume the grandparent had the opposite point: that it's obvious to anyone who's spent any time with birds around that everybody tends to notice the alerts they make. Other birds, humans, pets, wild animals.
- oh_sigh 7y ago
  This has been known by outdoors people for literally centuries, probably millenia, because disturbing birds can ruin your hunt. I was just browsing this[1] book on my bookshelf where it is talked about extensively, and it is far beyond just a statement of fact. [1] https://www.amazon.co.uk/Walkers-Guide-Outdoor-Clues-Signs-ebook/dp/B00H4EPBWM https://www.amazon.co.uk/Walkers-Guide-Outdoor-Clues-Signs-e...

timwis 7y ago

The graphic at the top of the article with the thought bubble is just fantastic

a-wu 7y ago
Reminds me of this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ouwtdH2zt9s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ouwtdH2zt9s
mellosouls 7y ago
I like that it's helpfully titled "Listening grey squirrel" just in case there was any remaining doubt of the subject.

totally 7y ago

Excellent book on this topic: https://www.amazon.com/What-Robin-Knows-Secrets-Natural/dp/054400230X/ https://www.amazon.com/What-Robin-Knows-Secrets-Natural/dp/0...

newsreview1 7y ago

We have chickens, and they do the same thing. They listen for cues from other species, and rightly so. We have an adopted (just showed up one day) guinea hen who has a jungle type squawk she makes whenever a predator, including a local sharp-shinned hawk is present. When she pipes up, everyone takes cover. Ironically, when she makes the noise, our barn cats look to start hunting/ crouching. They are fantastic predators.

jhallenworld 7y ago

But do cats make that chattering sound to lure birds with a false sense of safety? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=plPcu0Le1Ts https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=plPcu0Le1Ts

gaoshan 7y ago

Other birds do as well. They all pay attention to each other. I have a very active set of bird feeders in a rural area (so many species of birds and other animals use them at the same time). I am within sight to it for much of the day and it's very clear that they all cue off of each other. Some are more brave, others more timid but they all pay attention. A chipmunk or bird fight won't phase the others but a cat (or person or hawk overhead) will cause the birds to make what is, for some of them, a very clearly different call (usually loud and abrupt) and they all react at the same time.

mkr-hn 7y ago
I've watched birds land in front of me, turn their backs to me, and keep looking back. I wonder if they were assessing me as a potential threat for other birds. They do seem to let me get closer now.

rossdavidh 7y ago

We have a bird feeder, which squirrels cannot (usually) get to but they hang out nearby to eat what falls out. We also have the occasional feral cat or two that swing by. I can attest that they are all listening to each other sound the alarm, so it makes sense they would also listen to the "all clear". My wife also does, because if they sound the alarm that means a cat is nearby, and she comes over to the window to see if she can see the cat. This may have caused me to pay more attention to the whole interaction.

hokumguru 7y ago
What bird feeder? Because every one I've ever tried has been promptly ransacked by squirrels immediately after filling it.
- rossdavidh 7y ago
  Sorry, didn't see the reply until now. I have a nothing special bird-feeder, but two things make it harder for squirrels to get to: 1) it is suspended, from high above, by a rope around a tree branch; it is high enough that they cannot jump up to it from below (well, it is high enough now, anyway, since I saw them doing that) 2) just above the bird feeder is a dome, with a hole in the center, through which the rope passes. There is a stick which the rope is tied around, which keeps the dome just above the bird feeder. If the squirrel climbs down the rope from above, the dome keeps them from getting to the bird feeder.

causality0 7y ago

Fascinating. This particular behavior is somewhat widely known but it does serve as a hint that there are depths of animal behavior we haven't yet perceived. Billions of years of evolution have created fantastically complex interactive systems on the microscopic level, but we sometimes forget it's had just as much time to work on animal behaviors as it has their physical makeup. I suspect there's many more surprising things to find.

mellosouls 7y ago

Off topic, this does raise the question of who we listen to to not be terrorised by squirrels. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-45150298 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-45150298 (Sorry mods)

forgotmypw 7y ago

Over 100 years ago, in Wild Animals I Have Known (1898), Ernest Thompson Seton describes this behavior in rabbits. One of my favorite books.

tomlogic 7y ago
I saw this in house rabbits allowed to roam the backyard supervised. When the crows alerted to raptors in the area, the rabbits would get low and head for cover.
jacobwilliamroy 7y ago
"though the bluejay often tells lies for mischief you are safe to believe him when he brings ill news." It is my favorite book. :D

m463 7y ago

It works in reverse. I remember reading ravens and wolves cooperate to hunt. The crows alert the wolves to prey, the wolves take care of it, then the crows share the spoils afterwards.

ldh 7y ago
Sounds like what I learned from Ravens in Winter (https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/122665.Ravens_in_Winter https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/122665.Ravens_in_Winter) an excellent read.

technothrasher 7y ago

While in Africa on Safari, it quickly became clear that everything was listening to everything else, including us. It didn't take long to understand the various alert calls and use them to find big predators to shoot (with a camera!)

h2odragon 7y ago

I suspect the most distracted, hormonally frenzied squirrel is more aware of his environment and present in his moment than the majority of humans can achieve with concentrated effort. Go sit in a forest clearing and be still and quiet long enough for everything to decide you're staying and work around you. That place on that day will have a story of more detail, drama and character than any soap opera could hope to get. Tomorrow there'll be another epic there. The next clearing over has a different show.

lkschubert8 7y ago
Isn't that just by nature of the fact that the squirrel lives in an environment in which he has to actively search for food when he's hungry and one that has other entities actively trying to kill it?
- jdavis703 7y ago
  This is correct. When I'm riding my bike it's easy to stay in the moment. I have to be alert for busted infrastructure, innatentive drivers, impulsive first responders and all manner of other threats. If I'm driving a car it's mostly boring. I have to actively work to keep my mind on task. I suspect others are like me, and that's why distracted driving is such a big problem.
scarejunba 7y ago
Yeah, that's part of why we're better. We've got better filters. Think about all those poor people with mental disorders that don't allow them to auto-filter. Discriminatory power is gold. Subconscious discrimination is a superpower.
- jdavis703 7y ago
  As someone with an "auto filter mental disorder" I have to work very hard to read this post charitably. I know this is the internet and written text is hard, but it would be easy to perceive this post as "othering" folks with metal illness. I don't think that was your intent, so that's why I'm writing this.

hownottowrite 7y ago

In the birding world there's a thing called pishing. If you get it right you're basically alerting them to predators in the area and they come by to see what's up (and potentially mob the predator if need be). Great for taking pics. [1] https://www.thespruce.com/pishing-to-attract-birds-386698 https://www.thespruce.com/pishing-to-attract-birds-386698

jhow15 7y ago

I’m always surprised how, in my experience at least, people with less exposure to animals usually underestimate their ability to understand their surroundings and even feel emotions.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

lngnmn1 7y ago

Birds have no conversations. They have songs and calls or cries. Frequencies instead of syntax or semantics. This is how music differs from a language. "Science" nowadays cannot even follow basic logic and categories.

instagraham 7y ago

Why are they so distracted, paranoid, and cute? Squirrels are truly my spirit animal