Canaries, which are popular as pets due to their beautiful singing, have been used as 'coal mine canaries' to detect toxic gases in coal mines, taking advantage of the fact that their barking stops ...

Following a deadly explosion in a Welsh coal mine in 1896, an engineer called John Haldane invented a type of bird cage that allowed canaries to accompany miners into the depths. The small songbirds ...

The song is constant. From the cages lining the walls to the cages stacked neatly atop each other in the center of the floor, this second-floor room in this stately Maitland home is alive with ...

TimesMachine is an exclusive benefit for home delivery and digital subscribers. About the Archive This is a digitized version of an article from The Times’s print archive, before the start of online ...