Parrots have been known to teach other parrots to talk smack. Not long ago, a naturalist working at the Australian Museum’s Search and Discover desk reportedly took a number of calls from people who had heard wild cockatoos swearing in the outback. The ornithologist at the museum speculated that the wild birds had learned from once-domesticated cockatoos and other parrots that had escaped and survived long enough to join a flock and share words they had picked up in captivity—if true, a fine example of cultural transmission.
