A Kea Idea
If you know anything about New Zealand, you should know about our birds. We have multiple smart, playful, and above all, CHEEKY birds. You probably have even heard of the one I’m about to talk about, the Kea, most often known for their love of taking apart cars.
At the nearest zoo to me, they have recently added a walk-through aviary with airlocks for this mischief-maker on wings. The zoo is partnered with our conservation department, and a lot of our natives are here for breeding purposes or (the little blue penguins) because they can’t be released due to injury.
During this visit, we watch the Kea carefully tear apart some enrichment for the treats within, and we listen to the keeper talk about their habits and their intelligence — considered to be on par with a three-year-old human.
A little later on, we come to look at them again, and now they’re being weighed! It is a hilarious scene, and we are delighted to be able to watch. We all notice that the keeper is taking down the notes on a heavily padded digital tablet.
Me: “Oh, wow. That’s a big case you have on that thing.”
Keeper: “Hah, no kidding. We need it. If I put this down for a second, these guys will go for it.”
The keeper showed us a few beak-marks on the edges, chuckling.
We continued to watch as she tried to coax one of the birds out of a spot it was napping in, and, as we humans do, put the tablet down for a split second on the surface beside her thigh.
INSTANTLY, a bird on the other side of the enclosure RACED across the floor, running over my friend’s foot, in order to grab the tablet.
No destruction was to be had, thankfully, but we still laugh at how eager that Kea was to get to their desired chaos.