If a congenitally blind person learns to distinguish between a cube and a sphere by touch, would they immediately recognise these objects by sight if their vision is restored? This question, posed by Molyneux in 1688, has puzzled philosophers and scientists. We overcame ethical and practical difficulties in the study of cross-modal recognition by using inexperienced chicks. We hatched chicks in darkness, exposed them to tactile smooth vs. bumpy stimuli in darkness and then tested them in a visual recognition task. At first sight, chicks previously exposed to smooth stimuli approached the smooth stimulus significantly more than those exposed to the bumpy stimuli. This shows that cross-modal recognition does not require multi-modal experience. At least in precocial species, supra-modal brain areas already function at birth.

Ensuring high levels of welfare is imperative for modern zoos, but such organisations must also engage visitors in order to successfully spread awareness and raise conservation funds. It is therefore important to understand the responses of animals to visitor interaction to optimise welfare. Often, the opportunity to interact with humans may be enriching for animals, but in other contexts, this interaction may have negative welfare effects. We observed captive female Galápagos giant tortoises (Chelonoidis nigra) to describe aggressive interactions, characterize hierarchy using Elo ratings and assess the impact of visitor interactions. Elo ratings indicated that one individual was dominant over two equally ranked subordinates; aggressive interactions are discussed in this context. We detected significant effects of the presence of visitors and visitor type (keepers, vets or public) within the enclosure on aggression and activity. We suggest that previous miscategorisation of a natural behaviour (the finch response) as an operantly conditioned behaviour, rather than a fixed action pattern, may have triggered aggression. We then document changes made to the management of the animals to mitigate the impacts discovered. This work highlights the importance of empirical evidence in determining optimal management strategies for zoo animals with regards to public interactions and animal welfare.