We care to think that being able to use tools is a skill reserve for just a few highly intelligent fauna , but the closer we depend at the animal kingdom , the more and more mintage we discover are capable of using objects to help themselves in getting food . No longer are homo defined by our power to apply dick , and now , it seems , even rat aregetting in on the action mechanism .
The brown betrayer in inquiry were trained to complete a job that has also been used on primates and Crow . The task take the rats to use a hooked shaft so as to get a piece of food , in this grammatical case a bit of delicious chocolate cereal . The gnawer were then place in another situation , in which they were submit with two pick : They could either utilize the dependent tool as before to get the grain , or use an ineffective tool that would get them nothing . The researchers , from Doshisha University , Japan , observe that in 95 per centum of experiment , the rats selected the right hooked instrument .
We frequently call up that rats are not very levelheaded , but as the researchers compose in the journalAnimal Cognition , the rodents are “ able to choose appropriate hook - shaped tools to receive food based on the spacial arrangement of the tool and food , similar to tests carry in non - human archpriest and hoot . ” The rats were less successful , however , when they had to choose between two tool that looked the same , but only one of which would get them intellectual nourishment .
It ’s increasingly becoming ostensible that the power to habituate tools is far more far-flung than ever conceive of . The skill is no longer limited to a few healthy mammals – such as dolphinfish , chimpanzees , and , of course , human being – but also occur in other branches of the evolutionary tree diagram . New Caledonian crows , for example , are prolific tool users and are capable to craft target to retrieve intellectual nourishment even when they have never experienced the specific job before .
But it ’s not just our feathered protagonist who turn out to be much brainer than expected . Alligatorshave been observedbalancing twigs on their snoot to tempt nest - building egret stuffy before snapping them up , make them the only known reptilian to have been found to practice tools . Even some Pisces , which have the report of being in particular dim , have been foundto use rocks as an anvil to smash cockles as well as sea urchins so as to get at the nugget of marrow inside .
[ H / T : New Scientist ]
