Nice Gesture

 Researchers at the University of Tokyo were surprised when they discovered the Japanese tit fluttering their wings to indicate an "after you" gesture when mated pairs return to their nests. The reason this is surprising is that it implies complex cognitive skills previously thought to be prominent in only humans and apes. The flutterer was most often the female wanting her mate to enter the nest before her and it was obvious that the gesture was not about the nest itself but about entering since several birds and even some fish use deictic gestures to indicate objects of interest and that was clearly not the case with these birds.