Chickadees might believe so. Well, specifically spatial cognition that is.

Across animal taxa, females commonly mate with more than one male, even in monogamous mating systems. These extra-pair (EP) copulations and resulting young may increase the fitness of the female via a variety of mechanisms, including genetic benefits. North American chickadees provide an interesting system to study the role of sexual selection via EP paternity, because they are socially monogamous, nonmigratory birds that rely on spatial cognition to recover food stores and variation in spatial cognition is associated with increased survival, longer lifespan, and is heritable. Given spatial cognitive abilities are heritable and associated with direct survival benefits, these abilities may be under sexual selection if males with better spatial abilities sire more offspring and females prefer to mate with such males. We aimed to address these predictions by quantifying extra-pair paternity and comparing spatial abilities of EP males to those of the social male they cuckold in a wild population of mountain chickadees (Poecile gambeli). We found that 1. males with better spatial cognitive abilities have more EP young and produce heavier offspring in their own nests compared to their poorer performing counterparts, and 2. EP males have significantly better spatial cognition than the social males they cuckolded. These results suggest that sexual selection is involved in the evolution of spatial cognitive abilities in food-caching chickadees and are consistent with the good genes hypothesis, which posits that females gain indirect genetic benefits via EP young.

https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.110905.1.sa3

Branch et al. 2026 eLife

I don't find chickadees 'sexy' at all.
( what're you, a weirdo ? ) 😄 😄

On the internet, nobody knows if you’re a chickadee

3 hours ago, MigL said:

I don't find chickadees 'sexy' at all.
( what're you, a weirdo ? ) 😄 😄

In Europe, "chickadees" are tits. Some people find those sexy.

4 minutes ago, exchemist said:

In Europe, "chickadees" are tits. Some people find those sexy.

They have a common ancestor from about 12m years ago, I read earlier. They've diverged in behaviour since then. Ignoring the double entendre.

Edited Thursday at 09:15 PM2 days by StringJunky

1 hour ago, exchemist said:

In Europe, "chickadees" are tits. Some people find those sexy.

Hush,chile.

The real test of spatial skills is if they can drive the streets of Boston without GPS nav systems.

2 hours ago, exchemist said:

In Europe, "chickadees" are tits. Some people find those sexy.

Others seem fixated on boobies:

Audubon

Brown Booby

Tropical seas around the world are home to this large, long-winged, strong-flying seabird. In North America the Brown Booby is seen most often near the Dry Tortugas, Florida, where it perches in...

7 hours ago, TheVat said:

The real test of spatial skills is if they can drive the streets of Boston without GPS nav systems.

Others seem fixated on boobies:

Audubon

Brown Booby

Tropical seas around the world are home to this large, long-winged, strong-flying seabird. In North America the Brown Booby is seen most often near the Dry Tortugas, Florida, where it perches in...

Or, on the distaff side......

........cocks.

Sorry CharonY.
I didn't mean to start the slide of your OP into the gutter ...

53 minutes ago, MigL said:

Sorry CharonY.
I didn't mean to start the slide of your OP into the gutter ...

It has to be acknowledged that the OP, thought it did use fancy language like "extra-pair paternity," did concern itself with two-timing housewives sneaking off with clever navigators and having bastards. Sordid stuff! Not sure I can continue to recommend this website as family friendly. 😉

1 hour ago, TheVat said:

It has to be acknowledged that the OP, thought it did use fancy language like "extra-pair paternity," did concern itself with two-timing housewives sneaking off with clever navigators and having bastards. Sordid stuff! Not sure I can continue to recommend this website as family friendly. 😉

That is just the way the lower species carry on; it is perfectly natural to them.

Chickadees can be sexy though,as evidenced in the words of the ISB song "Log Cabin Home in the Sky"

#"With the chickadees singing a comforting song,

I'll show it's you that I love"/#

Edited Friday at 04:07 PM1 day by geordief

3 hours ago, geordief said:

That is just the way the lower species carry on; it is perfectly natural to them.

Chickadees can be sexy though,as evidenced in the words of the ISB song "Log Cabin Home in the Sky"

#"With the chickadees singing a comforting song,

I'll show it's you that I love"/#

Nice to acquaint meself with this band - sounds like they borrowed some old US country-western tune and adapted it a bit.

Hereabouts, titmouse is a synonym for chickadee, which could be handy to anyone writing a song and needing just two syllables. When I lived east of the Mississippi River, the common species was the tufted titmouse. When I was a callow youth, I enjoyed the mental image that moniker evoked.

I feel compelled to share that the song of the tufted titmouse is usually described as a whistled "peter-peter-peter!"

Mikado version

Edited Friday at 10:08 PM1 day by sethoflagos

50 minutes ago, sethoflagos said:

Mikado version

Looks like a Star Trekk episode to me.

That was the name of our boat ,Tit Willow.

We used to listen to the Mikado on our 33 (or 78?)rpm disks back then.

Think it was Gilbert and Sullivan.

(A policeman's lot and all that jazz

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=iySVVvMGZxo)

Edited Friday at 11:25 PM1 day by geordief

16 hours ago, geordief said:

We used to listen to the Mikado on our 33 (or 78?)rpm disks back then.

Think it was Gilbert and Sullivan.

Some staff at my school were leading lights in York Amateur Operatic Society, so I got regular paying gigs as trumpet in the pit orchestra. Learnt Mikado, Pinafore, Pirates, Iolanthe, Gondoliers, and Yeomen pretty much back to front. Nice little earner at the time - half Musician's Union rate for a pre-teen!

6 hours ago, TheVat said:

Looks like a Star Trekk episode to me.

That was the name of our boat ,Tit Willow.

We used to listen to the Mikado on our 33 (or 78?)rpm disks back then.

Think it was Gilbert and Sullivan.

(A policeman's lot and all that jazz

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=iySVVvMGZxo)

Yes tit willow is Mikado. The policemen are in Pirates of Penzance, however.

8 minutes ago, exchemist said:

  On 7/3/2026 at 12:49 AM, TheVat said:

Looks like a Star Trekk episode to me.

Do we have an attribution glitch in the works?

1 minute ago, sethoflagos said:

Do we have an attribution glitch in the works?

Oh bugger I was trying to reply to @geordief .

On 7/3/2026 at 7:01 AM, MigL said:

Sorry CharonY.
I didn't mean to start the slide of your OP into the gutter ...

The thread is going exactly where I thought it would be going.

Yes, when the OP mentioned spatial skills and extra-pair mating in chickadees, my mind went immediately to The Mikado.

The song's penetrating analysis of blighted affection in titmice and its correlation with higher suicide rates among (presumably cuckolded by extra-pair shenanigans) male titmice remains a staple of ornithology.

... and definitely not confined to the Paridae (tit family) either.

See "Cloaca Pecking Foreplay in Dunnock Courtship" for similar 'shenanigans' in genus Prunella.

Incidentally, for those unfamiliar with this particular LBJ, dunnock derives from the Old English for 'little brown bird'. Hence, it is the archetypal 'Little Brown Job'.