The Genius of Birds

Delightful and surprising review of current knowledge about the brains of birds and why it is a mistake to consider them "birdbrains" in the derogatory sense. Might just encourage me and others to pursue a new hobby of birdwatching - I came away enchanted and wanting to know more.

I was quickly captured by the fascinating details of bird behavior and intellect. I come away ready for further reading on the subject. The only criticism I have is that I wish it had contained color photos of the birds and shorts of the behaviors. A multi medium approach not reasonably possible here. Maybe someday with an Internet niter active edition?!

I hold my breath while reading every page and learning about the amazing skills and intelligence of birds. It simply changes everything we used to know about those flying tiny dinosaurs. I wish they could tell us what they are saying up there in the trees.

It is beautifully written with lots of personal details to keep the novice interested. A lot to be learned about the habits and intelligence of birds. Her comparison to the intelligence of mankind is a bit stretched.

Though this book frequently reads like a textbook and was laborious reading at times, I thought that it was great! I learned of new(to me) avian behaviors, as well as receiving confirmation an insight into behaviors I have personally observed.

For birders and nature lovers, this is a must read book. Ackerman explores the traits of birds and how birds demonstrate intelligence. From tool use among New Caledonian Crows to the adaptability of the house sparrow, she gives example after example. Impeccably researched with copious footnotes, this is a wonderful book to read. Scientific enough that it holds the interest of the experienced birder without becoming a dry ornithology text book. But even if you're not a birder, this is just a good, interesting non-fiction science read. Highly recommended.

This book blew me away - the science and storytelling blended together. I love birds, and this book gave me a deeper insight into how their brains work. Loved every moment of it - highly recommend. Great read!!

Birds are as common as grass but most humans give them no more consideration than the grass under their feet! Man always puts his species at the top of the heap when it comes to intelligence but few ever stop to think that a lot of species evolved on parallel paths with humans.

When I was about ten years old, I visited some my grand mothers relatives, in a fairly remote area, near Jackson, Tennessee. One of grannies sisters had a crow. This crow was very special in that it was stealing her eggs. She knew the crow was stealing the eggs but could never catch it red handed. One day shortly before we arrived, the sister heard a hen start cackling had looked out the window just in time to see the grow carrying an egg shell out of the hen house. She watched it carry the shell around the hen house but could not determine where the crow deposited the egg shell. Finally she found an old wash tub turned upside down with a hole in the bottom. She turned the tub over and found dozens of egg shells! The crow was dropping the shells in the hole in the tub. She was going to dispatch the crow but my brother and I talked her into giving the crow to us.

We returned to North Little Rock, Arkansas with the crow. We kept it in a rabbit hutch for a few years and really enjoyed it. The crow took a bath every day year round rain or shine and cold or hot. I saw the feathers on the crow frozen together several times. We feed it wieners, black berries, and table scraps.

My dad decided that his boys might do better on a farm. He bought fifty acres near Cabot and started raising strawberries and about fives acres of cotton. My dad had a "real job" working for Delta Airlines in Little Rock and commuted daily from the farm. We took the crow with us to the farm and finally let him loose but he never really left! He would sit in the top of a large tree in the back yard and always seemed to be near.

On day the neighbor "across the road" came over and told my dad that if he didn't keep that damned crow at home he was going to shoot it. About two weeks later the crow came up missing! We didn't have chickens at that time but the crow remembered "after several years" what a cackling chicken meant!

I would have had a hard time time believing some of the things described in this book about the Genius Of Birds had I not had this personal experience with our crow. I found the book fascinating, enlightening, and very timely. Our world is racing toward who knows "what" and all of the earths creatures will have difficulty adapting to the "progress" of such rapid changes in their environment! I am almost seventy five now and birds have always been a fascination of mine.

This book is for lovers of birds, nonfiction, behavior and biology. It brought me up to date on what is known about how birds navigate. It's fascinating to realize that we really don't understand bird navigation as well as one would have thought for the 21st century. Lots of interesting descriptions of fascinating bird behavior such as that of African Grey parrots and the endemic crow of New Caledonia. I took off one star since the author obviously subscribes to the concept of global warming (excuse me, climate change) and as usual, does some handwringing about all the bad things that are going to happen with sparse data to back them up.

This well-written book starts out being about avian brains. But the subject soon overflows its banks and ends up being about brains in general, ours included. The book chronicles the remarkable amount of research being done into what goes on in brains. It doesn't come to many concrete answers - those will take time - but the book does pose questions that amount to insights. For instance, birds (as well as other creatures) may be astonishingly gifted at one skill and fatally incompetent at another. Thus words like "intelligence," when talking about aggregate mental ability, are meaningless. On that account, the author abandons such terms for her title and uses "genius" instead, re-casting the word to mean what she wants it to mean.
Readers will find themselves taking this book slowly, much as they would a text on physics . I wouldn't be surprised to find it ranked one day alongside the most seminal and important books of our time.