Birdfeeding: Friends of a Feather Flock Together

From dinosaurs to birds: the origins of feather formation

Scientists reveal the key role of specific genes in feather development, providing insights into their evolution from dinosaurs.
Feathers, essential for thermoregulation, flight, and communication in birds, originate from simple appendages known as proto-feathers, which were present in certain dinosaurs.By studying embryonic development of the chicken, researchers from the University of Geneva (UNIGE) have uncovered a key role of a molecular signalling pathway (the Shh pathway) in their formation. This research provides new insights into the morphogenetic mechanisms that led to feather diversification throughout evolution. 

Cretaceous fossil from Antarctica reveals earliest modern bird

Sixty-six million years ago, at the end of the Cretaceous Period, an asteroid impact near the Yucat n Peninsula of Mexico triggered the extinction of all known non-bird dinosaurs. But for the early ancestors of today's waterfowl, surviving that mass extinction event was like ... water off a duck's back. Location matters, as Antarctica may have served as a refuge, protected by its distance from the turmoil taking place elsewhere on the planet. Fossil evidence suggests a temperate climate with lush vegetation, possibly serving as an incubator for the earliest members of the group that now includes ducks and geese.

Join the Christmas Bird Count from December 14-January 5.  This is a popular piece of citizen science.  To participate, see a map of active circles to find one near you.  If you're inside one, you can also count birds at your own feeders.

Bird brain from the age of dinosaurs reveals roots of avian intelligence

A 'one of a kind' fossil discovery could transform our understanding of how the unique brains and intelligence of modern birds evolved, one of the most enduring mysteries of vertebrate evolution.


Bird brains are surprisingly complex, and pack more of a punch for their size, which leads mammalian scientists to underestimate avian intelligence. Anyone who has tried to keep birds from peeling the foil off milk bottles, or keep big greedy birds from eating all the food meant for smaller songbirds, knows how smart the little bastards are. I've seen sparrows figure out how to snatch a bite of suet or thistle from an upside-down feeder!

A friend asked about pigeons, so I put together some links, and I thought other folks might find them amusing.

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A floodle is a giant puddle that forms in a low spot on relatively flat land. In some areas, they may only last a few hours or days, but in others they can last for weeks or even months. It depends on the soil composition, water table, and whether or not more rain falls. They can be natural, or because of human foolishness.

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... here seen in a green honeycreeper.

I was previously familiar with the phenomenon from photos of cardinals, where the sex division is similarly dramatic. It's also possible to have a vertically divided half-albino (or leucistic, with dark eyes) bird.

There's a trend in mythology and modern fiction where human hermaphrodites (whether biological intersex or philosophical genderqueer) present as male on one side, female on the other. This presentation is often attacked as "unrealistic" or somesuch, but that kind of division really does appear in nature for some species. Imagine being genderqueer and having no idea what to do about it, then you see a gynandromorphic bird, and you know enough about birds to recognize what you're seeing. There's a pretty good chance that you'd go, "Oh hey, that could work for me!" I suspect that happened at least once in history, and the idea stuck around.