Holland Audubon Club Meeting

Sept 8th at Hope Church, 7pm (6:30 social), 77 W. 11th, St. Holland MI

“No Birdbrains Here: The Latest on Bird Learning, Instinct and Intelligence” by Susan Schneider, PhD A fascinating thing has been revealed: birds can learn from consequences, as we and many other species can. Baby chicks learn to peck accurately, wild mockingbirds learn to recognize individual people, and pigeons have learned to categorize art and music. Even instinctive behaviors like imprinting can be more flexible than scientists used to think, and songbird song appears particularly malleable.

Join Holland Audubon Club at our season opener as we explore bird learning and intelligence, from everyday foraging, to learning through observing, to tool use. Susan will share her keen knowledge on how such adaptability may be critical as wild birds attempt to adjust to the many threats they face today and how scientists also take advantage of this powerful learning ability to help save endangered species. A poignant, timely program you’ll find intriguing and not to be missed. A Behavioral and Bio-psychologist, Dr. Schneider is an expert on learning principles, with many academic publications.

She’s also an avid birder and field trip leader. A Kalamazoo Audubon Board member, Schneider has served on the boards of four Audubon chapters and been president of two. Her award-winning book, The Science of Consequences, covers basic learning principles, their role in nature-nurture relations, and their broad range of applications. It was a selection of the Scientific American Book Club.
A member of the psychology faculty at Western Michigan University, Schneider is currently focused on applying learning principles to the climate crisis.

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This event was submitted to our community calendar page by an outside organizer and is not a Michigan Audubon event. If you have questions, please reach out to the event organizers or the contact information provided in the event description.