Early bird learns the tune
Scientists have assumed that vocal learning
in songbirds starts with subsongs — the bird
equivalent of infant babbling. But Wan-chun
Liu from the Rockefeller University, New
York, and his colleagues, have determined
that vocal learning begins much earlier —
when juveniles first beg for food.
When begging, juvenile male chipping
sparrows (Spizella passerina) exhibit neural
activity in part of the forebrain associated with
learned song, the team found. And begging
patterns appear in the sparrows’ first subsongs.
Auditory feedback is crucial to vocal
learning, and distinguishes it from innate
calls. Deafening affected the structures of
males’ begging calls, but had no such effect
on females; female chipping sparrows do not
sing and their begging calls are innate.
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