Here’s how honeyeaters and other birds thrive on sugary diets

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DNA tweaks let birds that eat nectar or fruit manage their metabolism and blood pressure The New Holland honeyeater is a nectar-sipping bird from Australia. It can thrive on its sickeningly sweet diet due to genetic adaptations, changing the way its body responds to sugar. Listen to this article This is a human-written story voiced by AI. Got feedback? Take our survey . (See our AI policy here .) To eat a sugar-filled diet, birds had to evolve some sweet genetic tricks. Birds that feed on nectar and fruits have important variants in genes that control metabolism, fat processing and even blood pressure. Findings published February 26 in Science show how different lineages of birds converged on similar genetic workarounds to let them live the high sugar life. Several groups of birds have evolved to eat these sickeningly sweet diets, including parrots, hummingbirds, honeyeaters and
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