It is generally quite well-known that kookaburras live in family groups consisting of a bonded male and female, plus a retainer of their offspring. Numbers matter in kookaburra society because a neighbouring tribe may have its eye firmly on the expansion of territory, and may invade a smaller group.
I once told all this to a human family of five. The oldest of the three children, a 12-year-old boy, had found an injured kookaburra on the grounds of their own expansive rural property in country New South Wales, and he had taken the bird to his parents, who then rang me for help.
Before the bird re-entered the wild, I told them how important it was to the kookaburra family that they had saved this female, because it had potentially saved them all from eviction, and death.
Years later I learned that this specific release had made a deep and lasting impression on all the family, and had directly led the oldest boy into a career as a veterinarian. He began to look with new eyes at the natural world and, more importantly, made a connection with it in such a way that he felt he wanted to know and do more.
In fact, birds have a surprising number of things in common with humans, some of which we have learned only over the last few decades. Both birds and humans can learn how to use their voice, and some birds and humans can even mimic other species.
There are reports of people who, hearing the neighing of a horse where no horse should be, were driven by curiosity to check in the yard. Moving to the source of the sound, they saw a magpie sitting in a tree doing a mighty good imitation of a horse.
There is an example of a magpie living in Australia, which had learned to mimic the name of the resident pet dog. The property also had a pet cat that tried to get rid of the magpie. When the cat approached, the magpie called the dog, which then came running and chased the cat away.