Parrots: Baby parrots babble like human babies

When we are babies, we learn to talk by making babbling noises.

Now scientists have discovered that baby parrots also babble to themselves, just like human babies.

The study found that the chicks learn how to make bird sounds by repeating noises they have heard from adults birds.

The study

Researchers looked at the wild green-rumped parrot population at Masaguaral Biological Station in Venezuela, South America.

The babbling noises from the chicks started when they were 21 days old and the researchers recognised 27 different calls, such as growling and clicks.

The chicks are listening and copying all the noises they hear adults make. Karl Berg, a biologist who was part of the team, said all these "calls will be necessary for the bird's survival as soon as it fledges."

"It's kind of a tossed salad of just about everything that the birds have heard up to that stage in their life," Berg added.

Scientists originally thought that baby parrots were quiet and didn't talk when the parents weren't around, because when they are alone in their nests they just eat and sleep.

But when Karl Berg studied the sounds he found the birds make babbling noises when alone.

"It seems kind of obvious that they're sort of playing, if you will, and practising and exploring, exploring with their vocal cords and their bills and their tongue."

"I suspect it requires some practice before they start doing it right," said Berg.

Studies also show that stress hormones play an important role in language development in human babies. The team decided to give a small dose of stress hormones to the parrots to test whether this impacted their birdsong.

They found that the parrots made twice as many babbling sounds when they had been given the stress hormone. Researchers will continue to study the impact of stress on babbling.

Berg also now aims to look more into parrots because they could help teach them more about humans and how we develop language skills.