Sparrow Sound Map of the Neighborhood

 

Icon Perched on a Tree, Isoda Koryusai, 1785

I've just finished Means of Ascent and am back to David George Haskell's "Sounds Wild and Broken."  I'm learning (156) about how bird songs -- the incredible diversity that individual birds sing as well as how songs change over time.

Other bird species learn not just one but multiple song variants.  Song sparrows, common suburban and rural birds across North America, sing eight to ten different variants of their jaunty song of accented notes and trills, repeating each variant several times before switching to another.  Every bird has its own repertoire. By listening carefully, we humans can build a sparrow-sound map of the neighborhood, drawn in air by ephemeral ink of birdsong. Their repertoires are just rich enough to challenge human memory.  From one spot in a garden in Tennessee I can hear five males and about forty song variants, a delight as I try to notice and keep each songster's collection in mind.

That would be beyond my ability!  But I'm intrigued by that sparrow sound map.

The brown thrasher, though, defeats human ears.  Each singer has up to two thousand phrases in its quiver.  These it shoots out for hours in volleyed pairs. . . . Some of the sonic variants are mimicked versions of other species, suggesting that learning continues throughout life, but most are the birds' creations.