These birds listen to their parents to avoid being eaten

Jackdaw chicks learn not to sweat the small stuff. Breakthroughs, discoveries, and DIY tips sent six days a week. How do chicks learn safe bird calls from ones that mean possible imminent death? According to new research, jackdaw (two species of bird in the genus) chicks listen to their elders--but there's also an evolutionary instinct at play. In a study recently published in the journal, researchers played the sound of predator calls paired with adult jackdaw alarm calls or the neutral adult jackdaw contact calls to 20 to 30-day-old jackdaw nestlings across 39 wild nests in southwestern England.