Friends who have parrots, have you developed their functions? For example, when the child's teeth are loose and he is afraid to pull them out, do you want to use a parrot beak to extract a tooth like this?
Steady and ruthless
In fact, the function of the parrot's beak has been proven, and the beaks of all kinds of birds also have a strong sense of existence, some are in the air to hold things, and some are digging trees to eat, what makes the function of these birds' beaks so special and powerful?
Drink a little, drink a little
Do birds have teeth?
A bird's beak is actually similar to human hair, nails, and bird feathers, with keratin wrapped around the bony beak. They do not have the same fleshy lips as extant mammals, and the cuticle functions as lips and teeth.
Universal Insect Catching Surface Predation Sprint
Eat the grain, eat the cones, and the seeds Explore the filter
Suck nectar, eat fruits, catch fish in the air, chase and bite fish
Chisel open, cover up to hunt, pick up carcasses to eat, birds of prey to hunt
图源：Buffalo Museum of Science
The old-timers of birds, a group of small, ornithischian carnivorous dinosaurs of the Late Jurassic, such as Anchiornis and Caihong, did not have beaks and relied on the sharp teeth in their beaks to hunt. By the Early Cretaceous, a group of small dinosaurs changed some of their morphological traits and gradually became morphologically similar to birds, and some of them chose to lose their teeth. As a result, birds that lost some of their teeth became extinct along with non-avian dinosaurs, while birds that lost their teeth made a big splash in the Cenozoic.
A near-ornithosaurus with sharp teeth
Source: dinoanimals.com
While the degenerated teeth of birds learned to rely on sensitive beaks, some genes that control tooth development were also lost - according to their genome comparison with United States alligators, turtles and turtles, six sets of genes about tooth development have been lost, and these genes control the production and development of tooth enamel and dentin.
The serrations on the beak of the Canada goose are not real teeth, but protrusions of beaks
Source: pixnio.com
Today, more than 10,000 different species of birds have evolved a myriad of beaks, which are inseparable from genetic regulation and natural selection. In the family, genes called COL27A1 regulate the long, curved beak of the Pseudopodoces humilis on the Tibetan Plateau, which adapts to burrowing and ground foraging. The CAM gene makes the beak of the Darwin's finch (Geospizinae) grow larger; There are also genes that regulate the development of osteoblasts and osteoclasts, which regulate the length of the upper and lower beaks. The ROR2 gene, which plays an important role in the development of skull and facial bones, has been found to shape many pet pigeons with short beaks.
The pointed beak of the ground can even peck through tents made of yak hair
Image source; mbelement.com
The mouth of the insect eater is a little thinner, and the mouth of the seed eater is a little thicker
Source: coolgalapagos.com
Parrot beak tooth extraction, piece of cake!
Parrots are actually our common name for hundreds of species of birds in the order Psitciformes. In fact, most parrots mainly feed on various plant fruits and seeds, and the short, thick beak can be said to be an artifact for pry open seeds.
Of course, there are also a few parrots who abandon the "Buddhist" life of other compatriots who basically only eat vegetarian food, and also eat some other chicks, insects, rabbits or something, and even peck at the skin and flesh of sheep (sometimes just to scare, the sheep will be angry and panicked, stumble and hit the stone...). Then the birds can eat the dead sheep), which is New Zealand's sheep (Nestor notabilis), whose powerful hook-shaped beak is similar to predators such as eagles and falconiformes. However, the menu for parrots also has a lot of vegetarian food, stems, leaves and shoots of plants.
I love hairy lamb chops
Source: keaconservation.co
also robbed people who didn't finish eating......
Source: YouTube
Sometimes, in addition to opening the bottle, the beak of a parrot has a major role to support its weight. Scientists have designed a balance experiment for a peach-faced peony parrot on a suspended pole. In this experiment, the peach-faced peony parrot chose to bite the small pole with its beak and hang its body in the air, and then swung its lower body to let its lower body grasp the pole. According to the load cell on the pole, when the parrot simply puts its beak on the pole and pulls itself, its head produces almost one and a half times its own body weight, which is not inferior to the arm of some primates swinging on a tree. Another study in 2022 also found that existing parrots use their beaks to climb walls. So it is not difficult for the monk parrot to pull out its teeth and look at it.
The peach-faced peony parrot has a beak and claws that look similar
图源：University of California, Berkeley
Even more so in the parrot family, they learned to use their beaks as percussion instruments. This is the palm cockatoo of northern Australia and New Guinea, which carves plant nut shells into their own musical instruments with their thick beaks. This skill is exclusive to the Cape York Peninsula parrot flock, while the New Guinea palm cockatoo chooses to hit with its feet. The music played may have the effect of attracting the opposite sex.
Palm cockatoo and his stick percussion instrument
Source: ktt2.com
They make different forms of musical instruments
Source: psychologytoday.com
Australia's cockatoos pry the lid of a dumpster with their beaks on the outskirts of Sydney, causing a lot of trouble for local residents. Someone put bricks and stones on top of the lid of the trash can, and it turned out to be to no avail. It is also necessary to mention that many parrots have well-developed mouths and developed curiosity, and may become even crazier than large domestic dogs such as huskies. Therefore, it is better to have a spacious zoo or something suitable for raising large parrots.
Sunflower Cockatoos: Show me me
Source: newsforkids.net
Cooling heat with the mouth is not unique to dogs
In addition to parrots, different birds also have their own beak morphology specialization. The familiar village goose, which was domesticated from the wild goose, has a beak with obvious protrusions, which are useful for crushing the stems and leaves of grasses. protrusions also appear on the beaks of the genus Merganser, which loves to hunt fish, and can hold the fry caught. Some predatory birds use their toothed beaks to kill prey and tear flesh, as well as cut and swallow food, as exemplified by falcons such as peregrine falcons. Of course, there is also a group of eagles that belong to the order Eagle but are called falcons, and that is the genus Aviceda, which has two tooth processes in the beak.
The muzzle of the merganser duck is
Photographed by Tianjin Museum of Natural History
Peregrine falcons and their tooth processes (circled in red)
图源：American Bird Conservancy
Some birds choose to turn their beaks into sieve-like filters to combat plankton in the water. Nowhere is this more evident than in the flamingo. Pelicans of the order Peliformes opt for a huge pocket under their large mouth, known as the laryngeal sac, which is an extreme extension of their blood-streaked skin in the jaw area. When their large mouths cover the fish, these throat sacs squeeze out the water from their throats by contraction. Of course, there are still limits to the size of the pelican's throat pouch and throat, and if the prey is too big to eat, the pelican can only spit it out.
Flamingos filtered with tongues and bristles in their mouths
Source: Ranker
Pelican: Don't run, I'll cover you
Source: YouTube
In addition to eating, one of the major functions of the beak is heat dissipation. In the summer heat, when dogs stick out their tongues, some birds will also open their mouths to pant for breath, in order to allow their bodies to come into contact with the outside air in a large area. The hollow and huge beak of the toucan can also speed up the blood flow in the beak when the beak is opened, taking away the corresponding heat, and the beak and the outside air structure help dissipate heat.
Toucan's large mouth for heat dissipation
图源：All about birds
Of course, toucans are not the only ones that use their large bills to dissipate heat, and according to many specimens of parrots preserved from 1871 to the present day, it has been found that these parrots have increased their beak surface area by about 10 percent in the industrial era under human influence because they have to adapt to a warming climate. Analysis of thermal imaging photographs of parrots has also revealed that they rely on their claws and beaks to release heat.
It seems that the beaks of parrots and other birds are a function that has evolved over hundreds of millions of years, helping humans to extract teeth and accompanying humans to change.
bibliography
[1] Wang, M., Stidham, T.A., Li, Z. et al. Cretaceous bird with dinosaur skull sheds light on avian cranial evolution. Nat Commun 12, 3890 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-021-24147-z
[2] Han Hu, Yan Wang, Matteo Fabbri, Jingmai K O’Connor, Paul G McDonald, Stephen Wroe, Xuwei Yin, Xiaoting Zheng, Zhonghe Zhou, Roger B J Benson, Cranial osteology and palaeobiology of the Early Cretaceous bird Jeholornis prima (Aves: Jeholornithiformes), Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society, Volume 198, Issue 1, May 2023, Pages 93–112, https://doi.org/10.1093/zoolinnean/zlac089
[3]https://birdfact.com/
[4] https://birds.fieldmuseum.org/
[5] Dickinson, E., Young, M. W., & Granatosky, M. C. (2024). Beakiation: how a novel parrot gait expands the locomotor repertoire of living birds. R. Soc. Open Sci., 11(1), 231397. doi: 10.1098/rsos.231397
[6] https://www.keaconservation.co.nz/
[7] Heinsohn, R., C. N. Zdenek, R. B. Cunningham, J. A. Endler, and N. E. Langmore (2017). Tool-assisted rhythmic drumming in palm cockatoos shares key elements of human instrumental music. Science advances 3:e1602399
[8] Handwerk, B. (2024). These Parrots Use Their Beaks to Swing Across Branches Like Monkeys. Smithsonian Magazine. Retrieved from https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/these-parrots-can-use-their-beaks-to-swing-across-branches-like-monkeys-180983694
[9] Young, M. W., Dickinson, E., Flaim, N. D., & Granatosky, M. C. (2022). Overcoming a ‘forbidden phenotype’: the parrot's head supports, propels and powers tripedal locomotion. Proc. R. Soc. B., 289(1975), 20220245. doi: 10.1098/rspb.2022.0245
[10] BirdLife International (2017). "Nestor notabilis". IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2017: e.T22684831A119243358. doi:10.2305/IUCN. UK.2017-3.RLTS.T22684831A119243358.en. Retrieved 12 November 2021. Database entry includes a range map and justification for why this species is endangered.
Written by | Great Qing Divine Dragon
Part of the picture | Picture worm creativity
WeChat edit | Zhao Zhiyu