One morning in the winter on the outskirts of New Jersey, Vladimir stopped at a red light – and saw something that he did not believe.
Cooper Falcon opened fire from a small tree, flew low on lethargy cars, and disappeared in the front courtyard across the street. Moments later, he appeared again, full claws, after a bird was extracted from the family garden. But what really surprised food bones is the accuracy of the attack. Falcons were unleashed only after one of the infantry pressed the CrossWalk button, which led to the appearance of a longer red light and a longer car line – the perfect camouflage.
Denitz, an animal scientist and mathematician at the University of Tennessee and the University of Rutgers, was witnessing a bird that penetrated the city rhythms. In a study published in Borders in ethicsDocumenting what may be the most advanced use of traffic patterns by a wild animal ever registered.
Falcon between stopping light
At first glance, Saqr Cooper (Hawk CooperiiIt may seem unlikely to be urban. He is a surreptitious forest hunter, which has evolved to imagine the trees in seeking to achieve small birds. However, with cities growth, follow some hawks. Urban life is dangerous – full of windows, wires and automatic cars – but also prey.
What Dinets noticed over months of fencing early in the morning was more than just adaptation. It was a deliberate strategy.
In the winter of 2021-2022, at the intersection of West Orange, New Jersey, he saw repeatedly a falcon from events, waiting for a specific sound – the infantry crossing signal that was mired when someone pressed the walking button. This sound means that the light will remain red for 90 seconds instead of 30, enough time for cars to accumulate along the sidewalk. Once the cars extension enough enough to reach a thick tree near the intersection, the falcon will appear.
Low and hidden behind the car waiting menu, Raptor was spending his time. Then it flew – low, fast, almost invisible under the umbrella of the vehicles – before crossing the street and finishing to a yard that is frequented by the bird, the doves and the stars. They gathered every morning to feed on the crumbs left by a family that was eaten outdoors the night before. Hit the hawk with horrific accuracy.
“It was the same every time,” Dinets wrote. “The hawks appeared in the tree in front of House No. 11 as soon as the sound signals … indicated that the red light will be longer than the usual, and it is interested when the parking list reached home No. 8, allowing the hawks to move to the tree in front of House No. 1 without being visible to possible humans.”
Smoyed than you think
Dinets argues that hawks have formed a mental map of the neighborhood. She could not see her prey from the tree, which was banned with cars and buildings, so she had to save the design and calculate its approach. She also had to understand the cause and the result – with the realization that a certain sound led to a predictable change in the urban environment.
This is not an essential air conditioner. The study concluded that “the observed behavior requires a mental map of the region and understand the relationship between sound signs and change in the traffic pattern – a wonderful intellectual achievement for a young bird.”
Raptors is generally unknown to being talented. The use of the tool and abstract thinking is more famous in Corvids – Gran and Western – and parrots. But studies are increasingly revealing hidden depths in the brains of other birds.
In fact, hawks and hawks were documented using Burning sticks to spread forest firesAnd hunting cooperative, and even It leads prey to glass windows.
But this condition is unique. A European bird in Ukraine was observed using cars and cars for the cover. However, no case has appeared by a bird using a sound – designed for human pedestrians – as a functioning tool.
Urban wildlife adaptation
Dinets believed that it was the same hawk, which has now become adult, later monitored with the same technique in the next winter. But after the infantry signal erupted and the family moved away, the birds stopped coming – and so did the falcon.
“In the next winter, I saw a falcon in the chase of adult feathers in the same way, and I am completely sure that it was the same bird. In the next summer, the STRETLIGHT sound signal stopped from working, and the residents of the house moved, so there are no longer a bird flock. books In an editorial.
Most hawks in urban areas in New Jersey are winter visitors from non -urban areas. This bird may have learned quickly, within just weeks of arrival.
Urban wildlife confrontations often focus on inconvenience or grandmother. Wolves in the backyard. Bears in garbage boxes. But increasingly, the researchers turn their view of hidden smart behaviors that help some species to survive only in cities but thrive.
The intersection of the city may seem a dark place to study nature. But while this hawk reminds us, it is also a stage in which development is operated in actual time.
“Cooper’s Hawks managed to stay and prosper there,” Dinets writes, “at least partially, by being very smart.”
