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Goffin's cockatoos make the same tool type from different materials.

ABSTRACT: Innovative tool manufacture is rare and hard to isolate in animals. We show that an Indonesian generalist parrot, the Goffin's cockatoo, can flexibly and spontaneously transfer the manufacture of stick-type tools across three different materials. Each material required different manipulation patterns, including substrates that required active sculpting for achieving a functional, elongated shape.

SUBMITTER: Auersperg AM

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5134049 | biostudies-literature | 2016 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Goffin's cockatoos make the same tool type from different materials.

Auersperg Alice M I AM Borasinski Stefan S Laumer Isabelle I Kacelnik Alex A

Biology letters 20161101 11

Innovative tool manufacture is rare and hard to isolate in animals. We show that an Indonesian generalist parrot, the Goffin's cockatoo, can flexibly and spontaneously transfer the manufacture of stick-type tools across three different materials. Each material required different manipulation patterns, including substrates that required active sculpting for achieving a functional, elongated shape. ...[more]

PMID: 27852942

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