A patient at a hospital in Antwerp once noticed a very strange nest in a tree that was bristling with thorns. On closer inspection, it turned out to be a magpie’s nest with plastic spikes on the outside. The magpie had stolen them from a hospital building where they were supposed to deter birds.
Scientists from the Netherlands Naturalis Biodiversity Research Center and the Rotterdam Museum of Natural History have found a number of other similar cases in Belgium and Scotland. The birds deliberately collect materials with sharp spines to protect their nests from being ravaged. Previously they used branches with thorns, then scraps of barbed wire, and now they have begun to break off and use spikes from fences that are set up specifically against the birds.
