Wild Birds Gesture ‘After You’ to Insist Their Mate Go First

Japanese tits (Parus minor) flutter their wings to invite their mate to enter the nest first. Scientists who observed eight breeding pairs of wild tits noticed that when one of the birds sat in front of the next box and fluttered its wings, the other would go in first. It’s the first documented evidence of birds using a symbolic gesture: one that has a specific meaning (like waving ‘goodbye’) but isn’t simply pointing at an object of interest.

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Birds behaviourally demonstrate what they want another to do. This is also a way of teaching chicks. See Rainbow Lorikeet Semiosis