Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!usc!rpi!uupsi!intercon!news
From: ooblick@intercon.com (Mikki Barry)
Newsgroups: rec.birds
Subject: Re: Importing parrots for genetic variability
Message-ID: <285E43A0.5120@intercon.com>
Date: 18 Jun 91 17:32:15 GMT
References: <1991Jun18.090020.24510@sserve.cc.adfa.oz.au>
Sender: usenet@intercon.com (USENET The Magnificent)
Reply-To: ooblick@intercon.com (Mikki Barry)
Organization: InterCon Systems Corporation, Herndon, VA
Lines: 23

In article <1991Jun18.090020.24510@sserve.cc.adfa.oz.au>, 
rim@csadfa.cs.adfa.oz.au (Bob McKay) writes:
> Of course not, the point is that the wild environment is so complex, and so
> different from what they are used to, that the birds can't possibly get the
> education they need just from being raised with their parents. They have truly
> enormous home ranges, migrating many hundreds of kilometres each year, and the
> migration paths are complex, as the food sources for some are rare, and their 
> locations have to be memorised. You are underestimating the intelligence of 
your
> pets and the complexity of the environment that they have evolved to cope with
> if you think that they can learn all that from their caged parents (or perhaps
> you're overestimating them, and believe that the parents can communicate it 
all
> verbally 8-)). It seems to take a young cockatoo years - perhaps five or more 
-
> to fully learn all the skills it needs to survive in the wild; how could cage
> learning ever possibly substitute for that?

I am going by the observation that captive bred macaws have been parent raised 
and re-released into the wild with complete success.  Cockatoos and macaws have 
comparable intelligence levels.  I am not underestimating their intelligence by 
any means.  I have seen my one pet and many breeder cockatoos use tools, solve 
puzzles, etc. etc.