If you have ever seen a hummingbird up close, you should know that long beaks and wings flapping up to 80 times per second is not something you want anywhere near your eyes. But that is exactly what happens with the helmet. After leaving it outside for a period of time for hummingbirds to grow accustomed to, you should be able to coax the birds to feed from a tube located right between your eyes. Going cross-eyed was never so much fun! Believe it or not, you can actually get in on this action for $80. [eye2eye via Craziest Gadgets via Gearfuse]

According to the photographer, Juergen Kienast, the sound of the engine as it sucked the birds was defeaning:

The pitch of the engine said it all. It was like sticking a bit of metal pipe into a blender.

Unlike the Hudson River Airbus, however, the crew and passengers got lucky: They didn't have to do any crash landing. The birds weren't that lucky, however, some splattering against the fuselage, others getting blended into a starling purée. Sad, but better them than the 80 people on board. [Daily Mail]

Agnel explains that he was simply curious about what sort of tune he could create by transcribing the birds into musical notes. I'm more curious about what would happen if he tried the same with the freckles on someone's back. [Vimeo via Wired]

The image above comes from Aeronvironment, and shows what it wants the prototype in the video below to ultimately look like. DARPA's goal is to have a 10 gram aircraft with a 7.5-centimetre wingspan. They want it to get into tight hiding spaces and send back GPS and image data.

Aeronvironment's progress is also notable because such robots previously couldn't carry their own batteries, and had to use guide wires.

"It is capable of climbing and descending vertically, flying sideways left and right, as well as forward and backward, under remote control," says the company.

[New Scientist]

The fish tank has a deep concave bottom like a wine bottle, so that the bird can fly up "into" the tank. I don't know what kind of enjoyment the fish would get out of this, but I imagine the birds would be entertained, up till the moment they realize that fish can suddenly fly higher than they can. The fish, on the other hand, won't notice a damn thing. Cuz they're fish.

There are some structural issues I have with the design, issues you might have as well. The disc-shaped base of the thing had better weigh a ton to support not only the very tall bird cage, but the heavy water-filled (glass?) bowl atop it. And anyone who's ever owned birds or fish will be wondering about how to clean the damn Duplex—one hopes at least that the fish tank's green gunk build-up reaches the point of intolerability at the exact same the bird droppings do, but chances are you'll be disassembling that thing all the time just to keep your little lovelies from croaking. [Yanko Designs]

I'm tired of birds pooping on my car, so I suggest that we develop a program for widespread bird-diapering around the US. An ambitions plan for sure, but it doesn't stop there. After that I propose that we put underpants on all of the squirrels. Their nudity is offensive and immoral. [Gadget Nation via TRFJ]

Inside its small body (20" wingspan), there's a low-resolution wireless camera. The idea, already thought to be a good one by Dutch police, is that RoboSwift can be used to surreptitiously hover over crime scenes or football riots. People below, if they did look up, would only to see a soaring, swooping bird of no consequence.

The dudes from Delft are so proud of their little 3-oz. beast, they reckon they can even use it to observe other birds without being noticed—they just have to find a way to fold up that propeller once RoboSwift is aloft. Stashing that long-ass antenna on the end of the tail might help too.

In the video below you can see it soar, spy—and crash into a tree—like a true master of espionage. [LiveScience; Reuters]

After investigating the story printed in the local Manhasset Press newspaper, WowWee's Customer Service Department determined that it has received 45 different calls over the past 2 months about hawks and other birds of prey swooping down and snatching consumers' FlyTech Dragonfly out of the air.

Interesting—although we probably should have seen this coming after the epic battle between the Dragonfly and Mark Wilson's cat. Look out WowWee. The animal kingdom is waging war against you and your products. [WowWee]

And here I thought robots were going to be used to help us cook breakfast and rob banks or something. – Nicholas Deleon

Robot watches out for woodpecker [BBC News]

As the birds in the area chuckle to themselves, the weighted bottom rights the seed container, ready for the next bird banquet. Just might be 80 bucks' worth of fun to watch. But remind me, why do we hate squirrels so much anyway? – Charlie White

Product Page [Solutions, via OhGizmo]

The Wordy Birdy Digital Speech Trainer makes that training process a lot easier by repeating, at intervals between 30 seconds and 20 minutes, whatever word or phrase you've recorded into it. Leave it on until your poor bird (and you) have had enough. Just be sure it's not within earshot of the neighbors—it'll drive them nuts. It's $22. – Charlie White

Product page [That Pet Place, via OhGizmo]

We're wondering just how effective this could possibly be, where the product's website promises best results if you use the Bird Chase Laser in low light. Couldn't we accomplish the same thing with a well-aimed laser pointer or two?

Anyway, we'd like to try this out on some rabbits who are chewing up our prize-winning Gizmodo garden, moseying away afterward as if they were searching for a bag of Doritos or a pawful of chocolate chip cookies. If this doesn't work, well, we'll just have to get out our elephant gun and go for the pink mist. – Charlie White

Bird Chase Laser [Bird B Gone, via boingboing]