Bird Buffet

If you've ever been to an all-you-can-eat buffet, you know how [important:useful] it is to carefully weigh your options. You don't want to fill up on salad when so many calorie-laden [delights:dimes] await. It seems some birds also weigh their mealtime choices - literally. A study finds that Mexican Jays pick up and shake peanuts to assess their relative heft before choosing one. That report is served up in the Journal of Ornithology.Foods that hide their edible bits on the inside present a challenge to hungry diners. How can you tell which fruits are ripe or which shells harbor the biggest nuts? We humans knock on melons or squeeze avocados. But how do other species select the highest quality snacks?To find out how the jays do it, [researchers:farmers] fiddled with their feed. First they [doctored:examined] peanuts so that some [contained:consumed] three nuts while others had none.When they offered these pods to some jays, the birds turned their beaks up at the empty shells and instead chose those that were full.