01521cam a2200229 4500 165916874 TxAuBib 20130606120000.0 130403s2012||||||||||||||||||||||||eng|u 9780375868467 0375868461 (OCoLC)803915957 TxAuBib Spinner, Stephanie. Alex the Parrot: No Ordinary Bird / By Stephanie Spinner, Illustrations by Meilo So. 2012 Hardcover Edition. New York, New York : Random House, 2012. In 1977, graduate student Irene Pepperberg walked into a pet store and bought a year-old African grey parrot. Because she was going to study him, she decided to call him ALEX - short for Avian Learning Experiment. At that time, most scientists thought that the bigger the brain, the smarter the creature; they studied great apes and dolphins. African greys, with their walnut-sized "birdbrains", were pretty much ignored - until Alex. His intelligence surprised everyone, including Irene. He learned to count, add and subtract; to recognize shapes, sizes and colors; and to speak, and understand, hundreds of words. These were things no other animal could do. Alex wasn't supposed to have the brainpower to do them, either. But he did them anyway. 20130606. African Grey Parrot - Elementary Literature. TXBAY