Krusty

An investigation into acts of self-pleasure among parrots and other birds has reached a climax, with the results providing welcome relief for vets and researchers, not to mention the birds themselves.

Bird keepers are often advised to discourage and even punish birds for masturbating, but the study found the activity was more common in the wild than in captivity, with researchers concluding it is part of a bird’s natural behaviour.

The report’s authors urged vets to reassure worried owners that the antics are not harmful and warned that efforts to intervene, which range from removing perches to hormone treatment and surgery, could be far more damaging.

“Our big finding is that masturbation is not a negative response to captivity,” said Dr Chloe Heys, an evolutionary ecologist at the University of Lancashire in Preston. “This is widespread in birds and we found it’s a perfectly natural and healthy behaviour that’s part of their repertoire of sexual behaviours.”

Researchers historically tended to assume birds either did not masturbate or did so only under the stress of captivity. But Heys said the behaviour was quite common and distinctive. “I had a pet cockatiel that masturbated all the time,” she said. “If you’ve ever seen a bird masturbate, you absolutely know what that bird is doing.”

The team surveyed bird experts and online communities of bird keepers, breeders and enthusiasts, and combined their accounts with others published in scientific literature. In total, they collected data on 120 bird species, captive and wild.

Avian onanism is widespread among species, including parrots, ducks, turkeys and chickens, and more common in the wild than in captivity, the survey found. Slightly more accounts mention males, but females were by no means exempt.

Typically, males would be “rubbing quite vigorously” on their perch, a toy or a twig, or on their owner’s hand, foot or shoulder, Heys said. Females tended to lift their tail and back on to convenient objects.

The activity was sometimes accompanied by wing flapping and vocalisations not typically heard from the birds. Asked if they showed any signs of self-loathing or Catholic guilt, Heys thought not. “I don’t want to say satisfied, but they do look different after they finish. It’s obviously doing something for them.”

Accounts from hobbyists revealed that some owners had sought veterinary help when they caught their birds masturbating, fearing the animals might hurt themselves. In turn, some vets had suggested disrupting the behaviour, by removing perches and toys and not stroking the birds in certain spots.

“In really extreme cases, vets would give the birds drugs or hormonal therapies to stop them doing this,” Heys said. “There have even been cases of surgery to completely de-sex birds, which is bonkers.”

"Vets shouldn’t be advising owners to stop birds doing this unless it’s obviously caused a chronic problem like a prolapse, but that’s the absolute minority of cases,” Heys added. The study’s findings have been published in the journal Ecology and Evolution.

Dr Ana Basto, a vet at the University of Lancashire who was not involved in the study, said the report would help vets give better advice to bird owners. “This research is pivotal and will be a step towards achieving a more holistic understanding of why and how birds behave the way they do.”

Dr Matilda Brindle, an evolutionary biologist at Oxford University and the study’s co-author, said the work added to a growing body of literature that highlighted how non-reproductive sexual behaviours occurred across the animal kingdom.

“The fact that masturbation seems to be even more common in wild birds than those in captivity has huge implications for their welfare, especially given that folk husbandry often advises bird keepers to discourage or punish this behaviour, sometimes even resorting to surgery and hormonal interventions,” Brindle said.

That’s antisemitism for ya.

Cardiometabolic function isn’t the same as metabolic syndrome. Cardiometabolic function would be like a spectrum or perhaps a map. Metabolic syndrome would be the section of spectrum(say red in the rainbow) or area on the map (like a swamp) that designates the “danger zone.”

Here the term “optimal” is used and that’s around 7 percent as having optimal cardiometabolic function. That doesn’t instantly mean 93 percent are impaired. The other classes are **intermediate, which is half of people, ** and lastly poor which was ~44 percent.

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41568-021-00388-4

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s40170-020-00237-2

Fat can be oxidized for ATP via β-oxidation (look up FAO or catabolism, or see above links.) Fat → fatty acids → β-oxidation → acetyl-CoA + electron carriers → electron transport chain → ATP.

Example: Palmitic acid, a 16-carbon fatty acid, undergoes 7 rounds of β-oxidation producing 8 acetyl-CoA total. After everything runs through the Krebs cycle and electron transport chain, you end up with roughly 106 ATP. Which is a huge amount compared with glucose(1 glucose is about 30 ATP.)

You aren’t making much sense though. It’s like if you took endocrine physiology and smashed it into a story about a single villain.

Weight gain is typically merely about CICO, barring rare genetic disorders. With an unimpaired metabolism, if you eat excess calories you will gain weight. No hormonal imbalance necessary. This is basic energy expenditure(Calories Out) to calories consumed(Calories In, thus CICO.)

Actual metabolic syndrome afflicts 30-40 percent of Americans. Not anywhere near 96 percent. Some people are just fat and diet and exercise will absolutely work metabolically to control their weight. Some people lack of willpower. Gastric bypass again proves that with caloric reduction their metabolism, in most cases, is fully capable of sustaining weight loss.

Cancer metabolism is also flexible. It does not exclusively depend on glucose and is not “starved” by removing carbs. Fats and amino acids are fair game for many cancers. Gluconeogenesis alone creates sufficient glucose to feed cancer.

4x is quite an exaggeration…

If you turn it off, you’ll have to do the captchas manually.