Small Birds With a Big Impact

We do this every day with domesticated species such as dogs or horses: They help us find something or carry us somewhere, and, in return, we provide them with food and shelter. In biological terms, this is called mutualism. Mutualism is defined as an association between organisms of two different species that benefits both. It is much rarer, however, for humans to cooperate with nondomesticated species.

In a recent blog post, I wrote about dolphins hunting with fishermen in Brazil. But today I want to highlight another fascinating case: that of the greater honeyguide. This is a species of bird, related to woodpeckers, that lives in sub-Saharan Africa. It has bold white spots on the sides of its tail and is about 20 cm long. The male has a black throat, pink bill, dark grayish brown upperparts, and white underparts, while the female is duller, with a blackish bill and black throat. The Latin name for the greater honeyguide is translated as "Indicator indicator." Like the English name, it fits very well, because that is what they do: They indicate. They guide people to bee hives.

Why? As we know, this behavior cannot be altruistic. So it is very unlikely that these birds feel so sorry for the poor, impoverished humans that they tell them where the source of honey is. Of course, the honeyguides also have a benefit. When humans find the hive, they open it with fire and tools and take the honey. Then the bird can feed on larvae and wax (Crams et al. 2023).

This cooperation is indeed very beneficial to both parties. Without humans breaking the nest and subduing the bees, honeyguides have extremely limited access to beeswax. Similarly, when the birds indicate a nest, the honey-hunters find it about 75 percent of the time. The success rate of the human honey-hunters is much higher than when they have to search for honey without animal helpers: The birds have been shown to increase the honey-hunters' success rate in finding bee colonies by 560 percent (Wood et al. 2014).

Reciprocal Communication

It is really fascinating how this cooperation works in detail. This is not only a rare example of mutualism between free-living wild animals and humans, but also of reciprocal communication. The bird approaches the potential human collaborator and gives a loud chattering call. This call is distinct from their territorial song. Importantly, the chattering call is accompanied by referential gestures as the bird flies from tree to tree in the direction of the bees’ nest until its human follower finds the nest. This means that the honeyguide produces a signal to guide the human to the location of the bees' nest. We could say that these birds are pointing informatively, which is also extremely rare in the animal kingdom. The human honey-hunter then uses this signal to their mutual advantage.

Interestingly, honey bees are also able to take advantage of human signals. Honey-hunters looking for honeyguides often announce their presence with nonspecific sounds such as shouting and chopping wood, but in northern Mozambique and adjacent southern Tanzania, they produce a loud trill followed by a grunt. This is similar to a hunter calling a dog to go hunting.

Honey-hunters learn this sound from their fathers—thus, it has been passed down through generations. But one question is whether honeyguides actually understand this human signal. If so, the birds should be more likely to guide honey-hunters who make this specific call than other sounds. In fact, one study showed that birds were more likely to guide people when they heard the specific sound (Spottiswoode et al. 2026).

Communication and cooperation across species boundaries is always fascinating—think of the dolphin Flipper, the dog Lassie, or the story of Mowgli and his friends. But could you imagine that not all these stories are made up fairy tales—and that there is real cooperation with a wild bird that responds to human calls and points for them?