Why aren't these birds ambidextrous? Birds use their feet for everything from eating to using tools. Whether they're right or left-footed depends on the burr. Some species, like flamingos, prefer standing on the left leg, and new Caledonian crows mainly hold tools with the left foot, but it's not always a species-wide preference. Individual Japanese jungle crows have foot preferences to hold food, but The species as a whole doesn't prefer left or right. Some researchers think this is just out of reinforced habits. Birds might stick to the foot that first successfully accomplished a goal because why mess with success? Other researchers suggest it's because the brain is lateralized split into left and right one study in parrots found that the eye they used most to look at food correlated with the preferred foot supporting the laterality argument, but Canada geese don't seem to have a preference at all, so it's still a bit of a mystery.