{"id":18459,"date":"2022-06-29T07:17:46","date_gmt":"2022-06-29T05:17:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.discoverwildlife.com\/?p=63420"},"modified":"2022-06-29T07:32:15","modified_gmt":"2022-06-29T05:32:15","slug":"do-three-legged-parrots-exist","status":"publish","type":"rss_feed","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/rss_feed\/do-three-legged-parrots-exist\/","title":{"rendered":"Do three-legged parrots exist?"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>

By Stuart Blackman\n \t\t<\/p>

Published: Wednesday, 29 June 2022 at 12:00 am<\/p>

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There aren\u2019t many three-legged animals out there. Parrots, though, could be seen as a rare exception.<\/p>\n

New research shows how they have transformed their beaks into something that functions as an extra limb for climbing trees.<\/p>\n

It won\u2019t be news to parrot fans that these adaptable, intelligent birds use their beaks to climb.<\/p>\n

Indeed, Michael Granatosky, who leads the research group at the New York Institute of Technology<\/a> says the work was inspired by his own pet parrot.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s how I first saw this behaviour,\u201d he says. \u201cTo see something climb with its head was super-weird, so I really needed to figure out how they do it.\u201d<\/p>\n

The team\u2019s work on rosy-faced lovebirds shows that their beaks are not used as simple grappling hooks to maintain contact with the surface while their legs do the hard work, but that they generate a lifting force equal to that produced by the legs.<\/p>\n

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The rosy-faced lovebird has strong neck muscles to support its weight while climbing . \u00a9 Steven Gaines, New York Institute of Technology College of Osteopathic Medicine<\/em><\/span><\/figcaption><\/div>\n

\u201cThey have to have neck muscles in place that can support body weight,\u201d says Granatosky. \u201cIn humans, neck muscles can only support 19 per cent of body weight, while for the parrots, it\u2019s more like 70 per cent. Also, in order to not pitch backwards, parrots produce a uniquely strong bite force.\u201d<\/p>\n

He says that, unlike most climbing birds such as woodpeckers<\/a>, nuthatches<\/a> and treecreepers<\/a>, which hop up a tree with both feet at the same time, parrots are striders \u2013 they use their feet alternately, which would leave only a single point of contact with the tree at any one moment.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis whole beak thing could be a consequence of the fact that they couldn\u2019t hop like a woodpecker.\u201d<\/p>\n

And neither do they have arms like primates<\/a> do. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe think of primates and parrots as having had very similar evolutionary histories \u2013 they are both ancient, arboreal lineages that show adaptations to life in the trees,\u201d says Granatosky\u2019s colleague Edwin Dickinson. \u201cIt\u2019s just that, due to the anatomical constraints of being a bird, they\u2019ve had to co-opt novel mechanisms to facilitate climbing.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Read the full paper in Proceedings of the Royal Society B<\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n

Main image: the beak of a rosy-faced lovebird functions like a limb.\u00a0\u00a9 Steven Gaines, New York Institute of Technology College of Osteopathic Medicine<\/em><\/p><\/body><\/html>\n

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By Stuart Blackman Published: Wednesday, 29 June 2022 at 12:00 am There aren\u2019t many three-legged animals out there. Parrots, though, could be seen as a rare exception. New research shows how they have transformed their beaks into something that functions as an extra limb for climbing trees. It won\u2019t be news to parrot fans that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":18460,"template":"","categories":[1],"acf":{"readingTimeMinutes":"2"},"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2022\/06\/do-three-legged-parrots-exist-scaled.jpg",2560,1984,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2022\/06\/do-three-legged-parrots-exist-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2022\/06\/do-three-legged-parrots-exist-300x233.jpg",300,233,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2022\/06\/do-three-legged-parrots-exist-768x595.jpg",768,595,true],"large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2022\/06\/do-three-legged-parrots-exist-1024x794.jpg",800,620,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2022\/06\/do-three-legged-parrots-exist-1536x1191.jpg",1536,1191,true],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2022\/06\/do-three-legged-parrots-exist-2048x1587.jpg",2048,1587,true]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"importmanagerhub@sprylab.com","author_link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/author\/importmanagerhubsprylab-com\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"By Stuart Blackman Published: Wednesday, 29 June 2022 at 12:00 am There aren\u2019t many three-legged animals out there. Parrots, though, could be seen as a rare exception. New research shows how they have transformed their beaks into something that functions as an extra limb for climbing trees. It won\u2019t be news to parrot fans that…","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed\/18459"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/rss_feed"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18460"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18459"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18459"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}