this post was submitted on 19 Dec 2025
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[–] RegularJoe@lemmy.world 45 points 2 days ago (1 children)

They observed that birds that hatched during the pandemic, when the campuses became empty and there was less food waste to feed on, had beaks with higher bill length and slimmer structure, similar to the wildland birds. However, after the COVID-19 restrictions were lifted and people started trickling back to campus and food waste became ample. Birds born during this period reflected this shift, exhibiting shorter, thicker beaks typical of urban juncos.

The Study: https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2520996122

[–] scytale@piefed.zip 21 points 2 days ago

Wow that is extremely fast. I wonder how many generations was it between changes.

[–] vatlark@lemmy.world 26 points 2 days ago

These where the types of studies I was hoping to see after COVID

[–] simplejack@lemmy.world 21 points 2 days ago (1 children)

This is because the government redesigned the bird robots during the pandemic.

[–] ikidd@lemmy.world 3 points 1 day ago

BirdsArentReal

[–] MantisToboggon@lemmy.world 15 points 2 days ago (2 children)

They just got healthier when they weren't eating ourshitty food. Hard to believe.

[–] otp@sh.itjust.works 6 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Did they actually become healthier? It sounds like their beak shapes just changed to adapt to what they needed to eat

[–] TheBat@lemmy.world 4 points 1 day ago

Preggo birdies were eating healthy and hatched strong kids.

Source: I made it up

[–] atomicorange@lemmy.world 6 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

Could be that, or the lack of humans lead to food scarcity for the urban birdies and the wild type were better adapted and thrived more and had more living babies for those couple of generations.

[–] MantisToboggon@lemmy.world 1 points 1 day ago

Fucking weak dick birds! Amiright