Coot hatching order tells identity; Life

Calling someone an old coot may compliment their ingenuity. American coots have the cognitive skill to discern their own chicks from impostors. The wetland birds use hatching order to identity their offspring, researchers report on line December 16 in Nature. Brood parasitism, in which birds slip their eggs into other birds' nests on the sly, is costly for the tricked birds...