Western study reveals importance of intelligence in species survival [Video]

Although brawn has been attributed to species survival in the animal kingdom, a new study shows that brains also contribute.

Western animal behaviour and cognition researcher Carrie Branch and others tracked the cognition of 227 mountain chickadees for over 10 years, and found that birds with better special learning and memory lived longer on average.

Despite the small size of chickadees, which comes part and parcel with smaller brain size, mountain chickadees performed extremely well in a series of cognitive experiments. 

“Animals have two interests. They want to survive, and they want to reproduce, so the smart thing for them to do is whatever allows those two things to happen. We found for mountain chickadees that means knowing where to collect food, successfully storing it and remembering where they stored it so they can retrieve it later,” said Branch.

A tagged mountain chickadee arrives at a feeder awaiting its seed. …