The Magpie and its nidopallium

Have you noticed how smart and aware Eurasian Magpies are? There appears to be a lot going on in their minds that we can’t currently discern.

Birds and mammals have 320 million years of evolution separating us, and we’ve both developed a great deal since those early days, when our relatives were the same lizard-like creature. Humans have a prefrontal cortex in our brains which is used for thinking and decision-making. It’s the part of the brain which lies behind our foreheads and is where our personality resides.

Eurasian Magpies have a brain region called the nidopallium, which is analogous to the human brain’s prefrontal cortex. It’s where their more complex thinking, reasoning and remembering originate. It’s the seat of their curiosity and problem-solving. The human prefrontal cortex and the Magpie nidopallium have evolved separately, but carry out some similar functions.

The superpower of the nidopallium is that it can alter when birds migrate, to enhance their spacial senses and ability to navigate, to increase their chances of successful migration. Birds brains are malleable and can change over the course of a year and change back again. Imagine how humans might change if we had the same power of neuroplasticity. Mammals haven’t evolved the plastic brain features which power the lives of birds.

Birds; they’re clever and we’ve only just begun to understand them.