- Feb 5, 2002
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Lost your keys? Can’t remember where you parked the car? If only you had the memory of a mountain chickadee.
These half-ounce birds, with brains slightly larger than a pea, stash tens of thousands of food items like seeds in tree bark, under dead leaves, and inside pinecones across the mountains and can remember their locations with pinpoint accuracy.
When winter arrives, they can recall the exact locations of their caches, a skill that helps them survive the bitter cold and deep snow of their mountain homes in Colorado’s Rocky Mountains.
In a new study published April 17 in the journal Current Biology, researchers at CU Boulder and the University of Nevada, Reno identify nearly a hundred genes associated with the birds’ spatial memory, or ability to recall the locations of objects.
The paper also suggests a potential trade-off may exist between having a solid long-term memory and being able to quickly ditch old memories to form new ones. One clue was how many of these genes result in disorders in other animals.
“Chickadees are impressive birds,” said Scott Taylor, the director of CU Boulder’s Mountain Research Station and associate professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology. “Their spatial memory is much more developed than many other birds that don’t have to have this strategy to survive cold winters.”
To evaluate the spatial memory of wild mountain chickadees, Taylor’s collaborators at the University of Nevada, Reno, led by biologist Vladimir Pravosudov, designed a clever test. They hung multiple feeder arrays, each with eight bird feeders with seeds in California’s Sierra Nevada mountains.
Continued below.
www.goodnewsnetwork.org
These half-ounce birds, with brains slightly larger than a pea, stash tens of thousands of food items like seeds in tree bark, under dead leaves, and inside pinecones across the mountains and can remember their locations with pinpoint accuracy.
When winter arrives, they can recall the exact locations of their caches, a skill that helps them survive the bitter cold and deep snow of their mountain homes in Colorado’s Rocky Mountains.
In a new study published April 17 in the journal Current Biology, researchers at CU Boulder and the University of Nevada, Reno identify nearly a hundred genes associated with the birds’ spatial memory, or ability to recall the locations of objects.
The paper also suggests a potential trade-off may exist between having a solid long-term memory and being able to quickly ditch old memories to form new ones. One clue was how many of these genes result in disorders in other animals.
“Chickadees are impressive birds,” said Scott Taylor, the director of CU Boulder’s Mountain Research Station and associate professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology. “Their spatial memory is much more developed than many other birds that don’t have to have this strategy to survive cold winters.”
To evaluate the spatial memory of wild mountain chickadees, Taylor’s collaborators at the University of Nevada, Reno, led by biologist Vladimir Pravosudov, designed a clever test. They hung multiple feeder arrays, each with eight bird feeders with seeds in California’s Sierra Nevada mountains.
Continued below.
Mountain Chickadees have Remarkable Memories–with Ability to Recall Locations of 10,000 Hidden Snacks
When winter comes, these tiny birds whose brain is the size of a pea can recall where they stored their food, allowing them to live long.
www.goodnewsnetwork.org
