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Leiden University scientist Carel Ten Cate said that what was
interesting about the vocal expression of the waterfowl,
nicknamed "Ripper", was not so much the message, but that he
could imitate humans at all.
"It's definitely based on the human voice, even though the
pronunciation is a bit odd - which might be the Australian
accent, I don't know," said Ten Cate, who published his findings
in the Netherlands' Philosophical Transactions of the Royal
Society biological research journal.
He said he had at first wondered whether the recordings, made in
the 1980s, could be a hoax, but they were made by living
ornithologist Peter Fullagar, who co-authored the paper. The
recordings had been kept in a sound archive and referenced
occasionally until Ten Cate rediscovered them in the course of
his research on vocal learning in birds.
Ten Cate said Ripper had a bit more in his repertoire - he could
also make a noise like the sound of a door closing and its latch
clicking.
Some species of animals, and notably birds such as parrots and
songbirds, are capable of mimicking human speech. But the
phenomenon is rare - if somewhat more common in animals raised
by humans.
"To find a species quite outside these groups...in a duck,
that's quite extraordinary. So it's an independent evolutionary
occurrence of the ability for vocal learning - that's very
special," Ten Cate said.
(Reporting by Toby Sterling; Editing by Mark Heinrich)
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