Problem-solving males become more attractive to female budgerigars

Who's a clever boy then?
There is considerable value in choosing a smart mate. The suggestion that mate choice has thus shaped the evolution of cognition has been around since Darwin's time, but testing this hypothesis is difficult. Chen et al. found that female budgerigars shifted their preference to previously nonpreferred males after these males demonstrated the ability to solve a problem that stumped the originally preferred males (see the Perspective by Striedter). This preference shift was specific to problem-solving and to choosing males.


https://science.sciencemag.org/content/363/6423/166.abstract

http://bit.ly/31QaV4v female budgies preferred initially unattractive males whom they saw solving a puzzle to get food. They did not prefer males w/food who didn't solve anything or female problem solvers. Strongly suggests males who demonstrate intelligence are sexy to females

https://twitter.com/Richie_Research/status/1143170822917558272

There is some debate on twitter about this and I really was perplexed by the findings and again. It shows how a human element is applied into the thinking here around what is sexy or attractive. I mean for a budgie, a male that is able to proble solve, is going to be a better match for providing for a family. How does even attractiveness even play a part here? Its about evolutionary aspects on who will be a better rpvider in order for the survival of offspring.

I dont see how anything can be correlated to attraction or how sey a budgie is. As none of us understand the working minds of a budgie through attraction. We can relate in regards to survival on what would make a better partner. I think some are looking at this, again from a biased starting point. Trying to then make 2 and 2 make 5

What do others think

Hmmmm. Not too sure about this.
Seems a waste of money to find these kind of facts out though. Hardly world-changing, is it?

Not sure I can answer didge. Nor do I know if I care.

eddie wrote:Hmmmm. Not too sure about this.
Seems a waste of money to find these kind of facts out though. Hardly world-changing, is it?

Not sure I can answer didge. Nor do I know if I care.

Fair enough eddie

phildidge wrote:

eddie wrote:Hmmmm. Not too sure about this.
Seems a waste of money to find these kind of facts out though. Hardly world-changing, is it?

Not sure I can answer didge. Nor do I know if I care.

Fair enough eddie

As an aside though, I always thought it a little cruel to keep birds in cages.
But I guess that’s beside the point in this topic...

Budgies rule...

Sparrows drool..

The late Mrs M, who was an internationally-acknowledged expert on psittacines (Parrots and parrot-like birds of which the humble budgie is one) did some research that apparently concluded that the females of the species, when kept in captivity, had a tendency to bond with human males while the male psittacines appeared to bond to human females.

Quite what she or mankind in general managed to achieve by this earth-shattering revelation (apart from many plaudits from fellow aviculturists and an academic qualification  more advanced than mine) I really have no idea; all I do know that she had a male blue and gold macaw that almost took my finger off one day when I was cleaning the ill-tempered bastard's cage out, an aggressive act that tended to disprove my dear wife's theory.