system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
ELI5: animals that express complex nest-building behaviours (like tailorbirds that sew leaves together) - do they learn it "culturally" from others of their kind or are they somehow born with a complex skill like this imprinted genetically in their brains?
gpt
It's instinctual. 

Birds reared in plastic containers build their own nests just fine. They need not ever see a nest to build one. 

Further, the nests they build don't necessarily model the nests their parents built. If a researcher provides a bird with only pink building materials, the chicks reared in that pink nest will choose brown materials over pink for their own nests, if they have a choice.

There is an instinctual template, thank god. Imagine being compelled to build something but having no idea of what or how. Torture!

That's not to say that birds are slaves to their instinctual templates. They gain experience over successive builds and make minor changes to the design and location.