2 HN users recommended this documentary2 months2020–2025score 3
Years with an HN recommendation, 2007–2026
Shared whenever birds mimic sounds come up, as a mind-blowing example of vocal mimicry.
A short BBC Earth clip from David Attenborough's Life of Birds showing a lyrebird imitating sounds, including a chainsaw and camera shutter, so accurately it is hard to tell from the real thing.
You might enjoy the superb lyre bird imitating sounds as mind boggling as a chainsaw--and when I say imitate, I mean I couldn't have distinguished the lyre bird sound from a real chainsaw. It's really mind-boggling to me. [this video]
Lyrebird imitating a chainsaw indistinguishably from the real thing
Here's the one that blows my mind: [this video] It's from one of (our honorary Uncle) David Attenborough's nature series, where a Lyre bird is imitating an analog professional camera, a car alarm, and a chainsaw. If I hadn't watched it well over a decade ago, I don't think I'd believe it. Search YT for 'lyre bird imitating chainsaw' for a choice of vids.
The Lyrebird from Australia is probably the best at this. It can imitate just about anything - car alarms, other birdsongs, camera shutters, gunshots, etc. etc. [this video] [link]
It's spelled Lyre Bird, not Lire (the spelling is correct in the repo, just wrong in the title). Not much else to say. Here's a lyrebird imitating a chainsaw: [this video]
The obvious and very Australian bird question is, of course, how can we search for: * A camera shutter, * A camera with a motorised drive, * A car alarm, * A chainsaw, ... etc ? [this video]
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