Are all domesticated birds similar in intelligence/behavior/personality?
To answer that specifically with respect to behavior/personality, no. My parakeet is obnoxious, way too smart, temperamental, and very lovable, my finches are ridiculously dumb, and the chickens are very curious, fearless, silly birds. M
chickens don't talk...or do they????ep
Funny you should ask...I just read in a recent issue of Backyard Poultry (I can look up the issue if you're interested) about how chickens communicate with each other, and it seems that it has been established that they make 24-30 separate calls that have meaning, split between age and gender (i.e., a hen makes different call from a rooster, and both make different calls compared with chicks). It was VERY interesting, especially with the example story that the author used at the end...I have been out with the girls while they are hunting worms in the garden mulch, and sometimes I find some before they do. They will ignore me if I speak in human, but I started making little squawks at them like they do to each other and they appeared to pay attention to that ( as in, they both looked at me, and then followed what I was pointing at and ate the worm).
So I think that they do talk, and that one can communicate with them given enough experience.