What Happens When You Show Kea A Mirror?

This week we have something I have been wanting to try out for a very long time. I bought in a mirror and put it in front of the kea just to see what their first reaction would be. This could be extended into a proper mirror mark test to see if they are able to recognize themselves at all, but that is beyond what we currently have time or approval to do, so may have to wait for someone else to try in the future!
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[@Loscha]

My expectations were met. Kea sees mirror. Wonders if there's another bird on other side for about 15 seconds, then, attempts to destroy mirror.

[@AnimalMindsLab]

That seems about accurate!

[@GeneralGorillaSonicOC]

The Kea would get 7 years of bad luck.

[@edwardpaddock2528]

@@AnimalMindsLab It almost looked like it wanted to rescue the Kea that was in the mirror.

[@CelebrianUndomiel]

“Yep, I look cool. Now back to destruction.”

[@dnolan8845]

We have a peacock who reacts for hours with his reflection appearing almost to be self admiring. He doesn't try to find a bird behind the mirror. He does the same with windows if the room is dark inside. So much so we have erected a large mirror in his sheltered perch. The female peahen is much less interested I her reflection.

[@cristinaximera9663]

So here's what I think: The keas looked right through your little experiment. Just too smart.

[@GiantPetRat]

We've placed our Blue-Fronted Amazon in front of the bathroom mirror, and unlike when I play him recordings of wild BFAs, he is mostly unaffected. The cockatiel, on the other hand, definitely thinks that his reflection is another bird, and starts to whistle in that nervous way they do, almost like he's trying to placate the stranger by saying "Hey, it's cool, bro, I come in peace".

[@edwardpaddock2528]

Kea Vanity Rating: 1/10 Kea Destructive ability: 8/10 Kea Cuteness: 11/10

[@lizpollock2376]

Kia Ora! The single bird showed the mirror reacted exactly the same way my American Cocker Spaniel did when she was a puppy. She failed to recognize the image as herself - and looked behind the mirror for the other cocker spaniel she had seen. She still does it sometimes if there is an animal on the TV, she looks behind the TV and sometimes in the room behind the TV (door is next to the TV) for the animal she has seen on screen. Obviously a difference in looking at a TV and looking at a mirror. But she definitely recognizes images as animal like - they are the only ones she barks at. Meerkats in particular deserve to be barked at.

[@mehere8038]

But what happens if a Kea is shown a video of itself on screen, INCLUDING it's voice? My lorikeets miserably fail to identify themselves visually, but very clearly recognise themselves & all birds they personally know when they HEAR them on video. Mine call in response to their friend's calls, giving different calls to stranger birds, but themselves they just stare at absolutely fascinated by seeing themselves & clearly realising that's what they're seeing, or rather hearing & they make no attempt to call themselves at all, just intently listen to themselves on the video

[@bisdak4666]

Change the color of the mirror's frame ( not black or yellow which you used these colors on the reward tokens). If you observed the birds were biting the frame because they probably thought it as a reward token. The birds attention was instinctly directed to the black frame- thus jeopardizing the deliverables of the experiment.

[@rickh3714]

Once they physically determined it was a flat packed mirror they immediately saw it as I-Kea & saw no further cause for self reflection.

[@DonnaFernstrom]

For a proper test, it's necessary to give the animals a chance to learn how mirrors work. So you'd want to get a mirror that they cannot destroy, and affix it permanently in part of their enclosure. Once they have had a chance to thoroughly explore the mirror, then a mirror-mark test can be done. Most animals, including humans, react to a mirror the first time they see it as if they are looking at another individual. They try to touch them, talk to them, and will often look behind the mirror to try to get another view of the 'other animal.' The self-aware ones figure out what's going on later as they continue to interact with it.

[@twelthman]

When i was young, the old folk in the town where i lived would hire a bus from Midland Motorways and my father as driver for a week-long trip to some part of the South Island. Always looked forward to going over Arthurs' Pass (between Canterbury and the West coast) because, sure enough.....Keas. The cheeky devils would walk/hop right up to you, and once, when i was distracted, unraveled my shoe laces which ended up with me flat on my face.The scene was always enlivened by dad's shouts..... "Don't let the buggers onto the bus"!. He had had quite a few experiences with keas when he was a lad, rabbit shooting in the high country, but they always fascinated me with their cheek and obvious intelligence.

[@auskiwi8116]

When Taz looked behind the mirror, do you think he was 'looking' for another bird, or just looking for a part of the mirror frame that he could get his beak into and destroy? lol

[@AnimalMindsLab]

Honestly, I think he might have just been looking for the most efficient way to destroy the mirror!

[@cedric_mrz]

these birds are awesome lol

[@joergnitschke5641]

If possible (and your Keas let you) , maybe you could modify the experiment similar to the paper of Helmut Prior and Onur Güntürkün, putting some kind of coloured mark somewhere where they can only spot it in the mirror (like below the beak or on the forehead) and then observe what they do when they spot the coloured spot on themselves in the mirror

[@mokko759]

Two years to late to the party but here's my experience: I have a little Indian Ringneck. When she sees a mirror, she'll toddle over, tap the glass a few times, inspect it for about 30 seconds and then basically ignore it. I don't think she recognizes that it's a reflection of herself but she most certainly realizes that it is not another bird. My mum's cockatoos are the same, they don't care at all about mirrors, they know they aren't other birds.

[@LFTRnow]

Mr Kea sir! We have found this strange portal to another world! Excellent, let's move it to another location and see if the location on the other side changes! Sir! All attempts to relocate the portal have resisted our efforts!

[@k.jespersen6145]

X) The idea of catching kea and marking them is inherently a little funny. Do you think they'd give alarm calls against the perpetrator? Best wishes on getting approval for the marking test! This video was pretty cool.

[@AnimalMindsLab]

The keepers do occasionally need to catch them up for health checks unrelated to our work, and there are no shortage of alarm calls from everyone when they need to do that.

[@wiegraf9009]

Reminds me of my chewing stim impulse as a neurodivergent person with ADHD. Just gotta use that beak!

[@AnimalMindsLab]

I think that actually sums up kea pretty well!

[@dubaspace]

I’m not by any means particularly a bird or even animal lover. When I discovered the keas a couple week ago for the first time in Christchurch and again now in queenstown, im obsessed. I was playing with them for like 30 minutes showing them a lighter and putting it back in my buttoned pocket…they were opening the buttons….they don’t look at you like a stupid bird….comparing them like to other stupid birds is almost like comparing a dolphin to a fish

[@FlyguyDePanam]

A lonely kea would show a strong interest in it's reflection I think. For these, may it be their reflection or a real parrot, it's just another kea ! it doesn't matter. A lonely bird would make it's reflection a companion, I've seen it many times, with those birds that are not "in love" with there caretaker and still a bit frightened by humans. But a bird whose 'social needs' are met will understand the mirror and will make use of it, for training and doing silly funny things in front of it and speaking to itself things like : "that's a good bird !" "pretty bird !" "kisses !", all knowing it's talking to itself ... But whatever it is, a parrot needs to investigate it with it's tongue and beak, and somewhat crack it open, seeing is just never enough for a psittacine.

[@mandas677]

The older keas in the group enclosure seemed to want to explore what was in the mirror while the juveniles just wanted to destroy it. I think the adults have into the juvenile chaos and let the kids have fun. Given time without the juveniles, I’d be interested to see how to adults who showed true interest in their images in the mirror would react with longer access.

[@k.jespersen6145]

That's... about the same as my Senegal's reaction when I hold him up to a mirror. Looks for a moment. Maybe tongues at the image. Tries to see the other side. Decides either to chew the mirror or to give me an "are you silly?" look. Did you see any sort of difference in reactions between younger birds and mature birds? It was a short clip, but I thought yellow-eyed birds looked more likely to approach with an open beak, and mature birds with a closed beak. An alternative experiment that might be interesting is what the kea do when they see a human they know duplicated in the reflection (maybe holding a colored token). My Senegal has gotten used to seeing me both in and out of a mirror at the same time, but when he first saw that, it really threw him for a loop. He wasn't sure how I was bilocating or which version of me he was supposed to approach.

[@AnimalMindsLab]

The younger birds seemed more interested overall, but I couldn’t really tell any clear divide between the young and old birds for how they chose to interact. That alternative experiment could certainly be interesting for someone to try in the future, I wonder how they might respond to that!

[@mehere8038]

@@AnimalMindsLab please do a sound recognition test if trying to do further self identification testing. I think, based on my lorikeets, that they are probably much more likely to recognise themselves from their calls than visual images

[@PaulG.x]

Kea sees mirror. Kea reaction: "Oh , a mirror , I'm gorgeous . Where's the food?"

[@maskman8964]

Kea have more powerful logic capabilities ，better than grey parrots ! but seems inferior to the crow？

[@aroha9090]

Honestly, I think they were like 'oh, there's my reflection. Well... that was fun for a second - I'm gonna go play with something more interesting!'

[@Barakon]

I wonder if Keas are trying to preen their own face via the mirror.

[@hmartin879]

Nature's demolition crew.

[@juliusroman8616]

I think the kea already know it's them.

[@kimbaldunsmore4633]

Anyone who has ever had a budgie will know that parrots just get used to seeing their reflection like us humans. The mirror (especially one with a bell) quickly becomes an object of enjoyment. Or in the Keas' case an object for destruction!!!

[@TheHarry000]

Maybe they recognize the mirror as an object to be used. This means that they could see and recognize themselves but this doesn't matter to them, rather they want to see what they can use it for or break it. These birds are destroyer of things. Breaking things is one way of seeing how they are used or useful.

[@paulg3336]

Dog sees reflection in mirror and looks behind the mirror to sniff the new friend. Kea sees reflection in mirror and tries to release new friend trapped in parallel universe

[@longboy7]

They know the mirror is an object and therefore dont think their reflection is another bird?

[@maskman8964]

Nice video kea smart than psittacus erithacus？what you think？

[@AnimalMindsLab]

I would say kea, grey parrots, and New Caledonian crows are my top 3 contenders for smartest bird. Grey parrots are better than kea in areas like language, but I think kea would be ahead for physical problem solving.

[@samanthabeauchene329]

I would like to see the keas react to a type of puzzle

[@bobdillon1138]

There are a few vids on KZbin with them doing puzzles apparently they are up there and possibly surpass the African Grey parrot for intelligence.

[@nonamepersonanonymous5246]

I may sound stupid not knowing that, but is that mirror reflecting full wavelength spectrum the bird can see?

[@loveurself764]

One was stepping forward and back, he definitely was testing of it was himself.

[@bizarrefruit9133]

Several things come to mind but the first is that their reflection is not a novelty to them; humans didn't just think one day 'hmm, wouldn't it be great to invent a thing that lets me see myself for the first time', the mirror was invented because it does a better job than the other things we'd previously seen our reflections in. Point being, a reaction to a mirror test works on the basis that until that moment the creature had no idea what it looked like. Since water is kind of important to animals, I don't think that is the case. Second thing that you touched on in the video is interest in one's own reflection, someone below mentioned a vain peacock who loved mirrors. On that basis one would expect birds of paradise to be more preoccupied with their reflection since appearance is key. If strength or offerings are the courtship test (fighting or gifts of pebbles for example) one might expect such animals to be less concerned with their own reflection. I imagine you'd also have to take account how 'playful' a species is; we know what mirrors are and know what they do but that doesn't stop us being amused/surprised when we go into a hall of mirrors.

[@Butterstix2014]

1:05 Aw poor guy :(

[@juergenjungkunz8118]

Phantastische Vögel……..😂

[@michaeldonnelly9190]

I think they're too used to seeing themselves anyway which is why they didn't care for it other than to destroy

[@LadyTime11]

seems like they wanna free the bird trapped in there? ....wild guess but how someone from the 80's would think it's a demon in the mirror if you used super flat monitors that turns into mirror when switched of :D might be wrong tho :D

[@mehere8038]

What were those vocalisations in response to the mirror? I don't know enough about their regular vocalisations to know what they were doing, but I had a really interesting response from my lorikeets on self-recognition/mirrors, that I think may have been being replicated here. My lorikeets miserably fail a mirror test, BUT they recognise themselves by sound on video, very distinctive, unmistakable reaction I got. Again I don't know kea vocalisations enough to know what was going on here, but with minimal knowledge on their vocalisations, it seemed to me they may have been calling to the mirror bird & when it didn't respond, having no interest in it & realising it's not a real bird & in their minds, it's not them either, as they identify themselves through sound not visual. My lorikeets, if you want to replicate similar, when played generic video birds, they give generic response calls to response calls in video birds & generally interact as would be expected with stranger birds in a social bird species. Played video of local birds & they respond with specific response calls to their friends. I found this by accident, watching an outdoor covid briefing & both mine simultaneously said "hello" & came out to look at the video (but with no urgency). I replayed & picked up on what I thought was a local cocky that a neighbour feeds, who always says "hello" when he arrives. I researched where the briefing was & found it was only about a km from my home, so well within that cocky's range. When I played back a video of them I had taken on my wildlife camera while I was out, so as to watch what they got up to when I wasn't around, their response was COMPLETELY different to the local birds or generic birds, they looked at each other (I have 2 of them) when hearing them on the video, very curious & trying to make sense of the bird next to them but their noise from somewhere different & when hearing themselves they had a really strong reaction & got as close as they could to the screen & stared at it really intently for the entire video. I have no idea if they could recognise their cage or anything else on the screen, but they were certainly VERY interested in their own voices & certainly appeared to know it was their voice

[@nv7287]

Can you print a beak for the poor lovely? (nontoxic durable light?)

[@MrSlanderer]

Toxic fragile heavy sometimes works...

[@nowellsacay7066]

Keas are rare mountain birds only found in new Zealand

[@nowellsacay7066]

Very smart and curious, can imitate others

[@eschwarz1003]

They do (almost all) look behind the mirror, a part of mirror self recognition. Look at studies w dolphins: kzbin.info/www/bejne/jZitnWeYhLOCp8U

[@nv7287]

the experiment is not about kea/mirror/ and human interaction.). wants more time to look at himself, but the human is in the road of a reflective quiet experience and angeling mirror distracting any chance (yes like me they are excited ... but should back away...(from the parrot wanting) to explore a new concept ... a daunting concept of I'm here and there!. (let me have quiet time to think about the ramifications of this......but noisy humans imposing the will - of don't chew, a silly human value - everything must be chewed to understand it.!!! and nothing has a deadline to understanding, simple it is incremental, piece, by piece... .. instead of letting kia like a child take it all in taste touch sound - it got frustrated and went to the other kea in annoyance/frustration and for a bonding support ...Hi other kia .....I found something interesting... but they won't let me break it to see how it works... maybe it was me but I didn't get time to really explore...

[@bsrfuchs55]

Are they used to their reflection because they have seen their own reflections in water before?

[@massimoleone2164]

I think that just maybe they know. They see themselves in the mirror, they look behind it, they choose not to care and just do what kea's do best. Destroying property.

[@VoroninBirds]

😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍 😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍👍👍👍

[@cliff4377]

my doggo was very mad at her image the first time, she ignored it every time after

[@cliff4377]

in the mirror

[@Peace-tk3gr]

The one bird's beak looks overgrown?

[@thomasneal9291]

one bird is missing most of his upper beak. accident.

[@alexkitty149]

Ah, yes. These beautiful car destroyers. That are endangered for some twisted reason (´°̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥ω°̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥｀)

[@brutifullroast2548]

There a smart as chimpanzees. There literally the alphas of parrots

[@online-dabeisein]

maybe they are just not interested into the principle of a mirror. This is not really a sign of intelligence ;)