Brown-headed cowbirds are robin-sized black birds whose range covers most of North America. From a people’s point of view cowbirds are what we might call deadbeat parents. Cowbirds lay their eggs in the nests of other bird species, and the cowbird nestlings are raised by the foster parents. Since the cowbirds spend their formative months with birds of an entirely different species which has separate habits, songs, etc., “How does a cowbird know it’s a cowbird?” A good question, since singing the right songs and making the right moves are essential to establishing territory and attracting mates, it’s vital that one do these things right. One would think that the cowbird’s behavior would be “hardwired”, that it would just know what it is. But work done by Meredith West and her colleagues has shown that this is not the case.

【生词注释】

cowbird n.北美产的燕八哥

robin-sized 知更鸟般大小的

deadbeat a.游手好闲的

formative a.影响发展的

territory n.领地

hardwired adj.天生的

【参考译文】

棕头色的燕八哥是知更鸟般大小的黑鸟，它便不再北美的大部分地区。在人们看来，燕八哥是游手好闲的父母。它将蛋缠在其他鸟类的我中，幼鸟是由其他鸟类养育的。因为燕八哥在发育阶段是和完全不同种类的鸟在一起生活，那些鸟的习惯和叫声都不一样。“燕八哥如何知道那是燕八哥吗？问得好，因为适当的叫声和合适的动作对于建立领地和吸引配偶来说都是基本的。燕八哥能正确地做这些事很重要。人们可能认为燕八哥的行为是“天生的”， 燕八哥天生就知道该如何做。但是Meredith West和同事的研究表明事实并不是这样。