Songbird
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A songbird is a bird belonging to the order of Passeriformes (ca. 4000 species), in which the vocal organ is developed in such a way as to produce various sound notes, commonly known as bird song. There is evidence to suggest that songbirds evolved about 50 million years ago in the western part of Gondwana that later became Australia, New Zealand, New Guinea and Antarctica, before spreading around the world.
This 'bird song' is essentially territorial in that it communicates the identity and whereabouts of an individual to other birds and also signals sexual intentions. It is not to be confused with bird calls, which are used for alarms and contact, and are especially important in birds that feed or migrate in flocks.
Other birds have songs to attract mates or hold territory, but these are usually simple and repetitive, lacking the variety of many passerine songs. The monotonous repetition of the Common Cuckoo or Little Crake can be contrasted with the variety of a Nightingale or Marsh Warbler.
Although many songbirds have songs which are pleasant to the human ear, this is not invariably the case. Many members of the crow family make croaks or screeches which sound harsh to humans.
For more information about Songbird, read the full article at
Wikipedia.
This text uses material from Wikipedia and is available under the GNU Free Documentation License.
News tagged with songbirds
First evidence for a second breeding season among migratory songbirds
Oct 26, 2009 |
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Biologists for the first time have documented a second breeding season during the annual cycle of five songbird species that spend summers in temperate North America and winters in tropical Central and South ...
Transgenic songbirds provide new tool to understand the brain
Oct 05, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- Over the decades, scientists have learned a lot about the basic life processes shared by many animals — including people — by manipulating the DNA of the "lower" species, such as mice and worms. But to date, ...
Transgenic songbirds provide new tool to understand the brain
Sep 29, 2009 |
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A new genetic tool will enable scientists to study vocal learning and neurogenesis at the molecular level in songbirds.
Canaries: A bad performance is better than no performance at all (w/Audio)
May 27, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- The learning of birdsong resembles the learning of speech in humans. Crucial for the process are acoustic perception and the ability to produce sound. Social isolation leads to a disturbed ...
Faithful males do not bring flowers
May 19, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- Fairy-wrens are notorious for their infidelity: despite living in seemingly harmonious monogamous pairs, females produce mostly illegitimate young, and males spend more time courting other ...
Mockingbirds, no bird brains, can recognize a face in a crowd
May 18, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- The birds are watching. They know who you are. And they will attack. Nope, not Hitchcock. It's science.
Owls' dawn and dusk concerts promote visual communication
Apr 08, 2009 |
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Reporting in the online, open-access journal PLoS ONE April 8, Vincenzo Penteriani and Maria Delgado of the Estacion Biologica de Doñana, Spain, describe the evolution of white throat badges in association with d ...
New study shows that in horse play, adult-to-young ratio is key
Mar 17, 2009 |
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Adults of many animal species play a crucial role in the social development of youngsters. A new study published March 18 in the online, peer-reviewed, open-access journal PLoS ONE, reveals that the ratio of adults to you ...
Execretion analysis aids primate social studies
Feb 15, 2009 |
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The arrival of molecular genetic analysis of both genes and hormones is providing scientists unexpected and unprecedented information about animals -- provided the researchers can find ways to get acceptable samples, said ...
Songbirds fly 3 times faster than expected (Video)
Biology /
Feb 12, 2009 |
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A York University researcher has tracked the migration of songbirds by outfitting them with tiny geolocator backpacks - a world first - revealing that scientists have underestimated their flight performance ...
Songbirds may hold key to advances in treatment of brain degeneration
Biology /
Aug 05, 2008 |
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Ongoing research at Lehigh University may one day help make strides toward therapeutic advances in the treatment of diseases that involve the loss of memory and brain degeneration such as Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, and stroke. ...
Superfast muscles in songbirds
Biology /
Jul 09, 2008 |
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Certain songbirds can contract their vocal muscles 100 times faster than humans can blink an eye – placing the birds with a handful of animals that have evolved superfast muscles, University of Utah researchers ...
