The information comes from Xinhua News Agency.
Nine little sparrows huddled neatly on the wheels to keep warm
Even in the excessively warm south, we have finally felt the chill in recent days, and the maximum temperature has finally dropped below 10 degrees! I know that my friends in the north must be a little speechless, but it is really a long time since we southerners.
I personally prefer cold weather, because by wearing more, drinking hot water, turning on the heater, etc., you can solve the problem of thermal insulation, compared to the summer even if you strip naked, it is hot, and it is not good for your health to turn on the air conditioner for too long. There are also many strategies for keeping animals warm in the wild, such as hoarding fat in winter, hibernating, migrating to warmer areas, or just huddling together to keep warm.
Recently, some netizens in Nagqu, Tibet, filmed a warm scene of animals warming up: 9 round little sparrows leaning closely together and standing on the wheels to keep warm. The picture is indeed very warm, and it is difficult for us who have a strong family concept not to recall the feeling of staying at home with our family in winter when we were children.
Birds like this are not just for warmth, today we will talk about the social habits of birds.
The social habits of birds
In the case of flamingos, they use social habits to organize all the key aspects of their lives – breeding, feeding, and courtship. Their ecological niche is very narrow and they don't have much habitat to choose from, so they must be social to survive.
In social life, flamingos can make sure that they are able to show their good qualities and beauty to as many of their kind as possible, and make contact with other people as much as possible, thus increasing their chances of attracting the same quality mates, thus increasing the quality of the population.
Some migratory birds with long migration routes also use formation to fly in formation to save energy during the flight. By flying in each other's slipstreams, the aim is to fly in the most energy-efficient way.
Most migratory birds live in groups for the same purpose.
Some resident birds will also begin to gather in large numbers after the winter is about to begin, and their purpose is more inclined to survive. We can occasionally see some hot searches saying "A large number of birds gather in the XX community, causing panic!" and other news, in fact, they are their normal habits, that is, human beings are attached to the reinforced concrete jungle and are blinded, resulting in too rare and strange.
A large number of birds can help protect them from predators in the first place. A large flock of birds has a better chance of spotting predators than a single bird. In addition, staying in a flock of birds means that it is more difficult for predators to identify a single target. It has even been recorded that some finches will gather to fight back against predators.
Large gatherings are also good for foraging. As soon as one bird in the flock finds a reliable source of food, it will selflessly alert the other birds, and the whole flock will benefit from it. Pelicans are quite clever at this, and they will look for other animals to forage for food, so as to find a more suitable foraging area.
Acting together naturally means forming nesting colonies, and concentrating nests in one area makes it easier for adults to care for vulnerable chicks. During the cold winter months, a large number of birds are close to each other, transferring heat to each other, which can also improve their chances of survival.
I think the most amazing and humane thing is that the experienced birds are happy to pass on their experience to the younger birds, and in the exchange of information with each other, these birds pass on the hope of the continuation of the entire population.
postscript
For the improvised, gathering is a survival strategy, while for migratory birds, gathering is a way to survive. As a result, migratory birds are particularly vulnerable to habitat loss, and if a transit point along a key migratory route disappears or becomes contaminated, they are forced to find a more suitable stopover, and if the search process is not fast enough, they can die due to lack of food.
This is why humans attach great importance to the protection of wetlands along the migratory bird routes, which can be said to be a key operation to protect migratory birds. Of course, the resident birds are also in urgent need of protection, but from the perspective of today's discussion, they are relatively less affected.