Brains of a feather

Birds do the darnedest things. They fly, of course. They sing. They hunt in pitch darkness. They hide their food and remember where they put it. They use tools and migrate over astonishingly vast distances—sometimes even sleeping while in flight. How do they do all this? What's going on in their brains that makes these and other remarkable behaviors possible? How did their evolutionary path mold them into the incredible creatures they are today?

My guests today are Dr. Andrew Iwaniuk and Dr. Georg Striedter. Andrew is a comparative neuroscientist and Associate Professor at the University of Lethbridge in Canada. Georg is a Professor of Neurobiology and Behavior at the University of California, Irvine. Together they are the authors of the new book, Bird Brains and Behavior: A Synthesis (available open access here).

Here, Georg, Andrew, and I consider the deep history of birds—how they skirted the mass extinction event that felled the dinosaurs, and then radiated out into the 11,000 plus species we know today. We talk about how bird brains differ from those of mammals and reptiles—in terms of their size, but also in terms of their major structures, and in terms of their wrinkliness. We tour some of the most peculiar and perplexing bird behaviors, and consider their neural and anatomical underpinnings. Finally, we consider what we can learn from bird brains, not just about birds but about brains in general—how they evolve, how they get wired up, how they do and do not vary. Along the way we touch on barn owls, hummingbirds, megapodes, mallards, pigeons, parrots, starlings, and underestimated waterfowl; we touch on how birds' brains change with the seasons; the enduring mystery of magnetoreception; the possibility of olfactory maps; the optocollic reflex; the social intelligence hypothesis and the extractive foraging hypothesis; precocial versus altricial bird species; split-body gynandromorphy; and the future of non-invasive work in bird neuroscience.

Season 7 of Many Minds is now gathering steam. We've got some great episodes in the works for you. Just a little reminder that we'd be grateful—thrilled, even—if you could help us get the word out about our show. You might do this by leaving a rating or a review, or by telling a colleague about us. We really appreciate the support, friends!

Without further ado, here's my conversation with Dr. Georg Striedter and Dr. Andrew Iwaniuk. Enjoy!

Notes

8:00 – For more on the deep history of the brains of birds and other vertebrates, see: Dr. Striedter's book (co-authored with R. Glenn Northcutt), Brains Through Time; this paper authored by Dr. Striedter and colleagues; and this paper authored by Dr. Iwaniuk and colleagues.

9:30 – The paper on neuron density in birds, by Dr. Pavel Němec and colleagues.

20:00 – For more about Dr. Striedter and colleagues revising some of the terminology for bird brain structures, see here and here.

24:00 – A paper by Dr. Striedter and colleagues on cortical folding.

34:00 – A recent paper describing seasonal neurogenesis in European starlings.

38:00 – A paper on the phenomenon of unihemispheric sleep across species.

42:00 – A video demonstrating the optocollic reflex in a bird.

45:00 – A paper on the puzzles of magnetoreception in birds and other animals.

51:00 – A classic paper on sound localization in barn owls.

54:00 – A paper by Dr. Iwaniuk and colleagues showing that harriers have an auditory system much like the (better-studied) owl.

58:00 – For more on place cells, the hippocampus, and cognitive maps, see our previous episode with Dr. Hugo Spiers. For more on the evolution of the hippocampus in birds and reptiles, see Dr. Striedter's paper here.

1:02:00 – For images of gynandromorphy in birds, see here and here.

1:10:00 – For a recent paper on "parental provisioning," the precocial-altricial spectrum, and brain size in birds, see here.

1:13:00 – For examples of research on the social intelligence hypothesis in birds and other animals, see here and here.

1:18:00 – For work by Dr. Iwaniuk and colleagues on some of the most interesting features of parrot brains, see here.

1:27:00 – The Avonet database.

Recommendations

Flight Paths, by Rebecca Heisman

An Immense World, by Ed Yong [former guest!]

Mind of the Raven, by Bernd Heinrich

Bird Brain, by Nathan Emery

Soul Made Flesh, by Carl Zimmer

Tile image credit: Image by Getty Images via Unsplash

Many Minds is a project of the Diverse Intelligences Summer Institute, which is made possible by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation to Indiana University. The show is hosted and produced by Kensy Cooperrider, with help from Assistant Producer Urte Laukaityte and with creative support from DISI Directors Erica Cartmill and Jacob Foster. Our artwork is by Ben Oldroyd.

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