Abstract
Bird Song and Weather.—Changes in weather, and especially sharp frost or snow, influence the amount of bird song, but the influence is different upon different species. H. G. Alexander has made careful observations of the effect of decided spells of hard weather upon birds in Birmingham (British Birds, Sept., p. 97). Frost reduces the amount of song, and effects especially the ground-feeding species, such as skylarks and thrushes, but cold winds have the same effect upon more arboreal feeders. Some species respond vocally to sunshine, like the coal-tit, and some are encouraged by rain, like the blackbird. It is suggested that sunshine or rain may affect favourably the food supply of these birds and thus may induce song, but rain stimulates blackbirds more than either thrushes or robins, although the food is very similar. There may be curious idiosyncrasies in the behaviour of closely related species. The song-thrush, the author says, sings in the early morning, and from late November onwards in favourable weather; the blackbird is rarely heard until February, and most of its early song is in the afternoon. Perhaps the ‘song’ means something different for the two species—more of a normal outlet for surplus energy for the song-thrush, more of a love song for the blackbird.
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Research Items. Nature 128, 549–550 (1931). https://doi.org/10.1038/128549a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/128549a0