First
off, just to clarify, the first part of this post is no




First
off, just to clarify, the first part of this post is not a bird report, however
I do think it is still appropriate for this list.  Over this past semester at Frostburg State
University I took a class that allowed me to design and conduct my own research
project.  In preparation for the course I
began reading some literature and came across several papers that found various
species of birds (such as House Finches) that will raise the pitch of their
song in order to not be masked by the background noise in urban
environments.  This information made me
wonder if birds were doing this in the woods as well.  Another factor that could mask a bird’s song
is foliage density, and so I decided to design a project to see if I could
detect a difference in Black-capped Chickadee song between birds singing from
deciduous trees and coniferous trees.

                I proceeded to take recordings of the Black-capped
Chickadee “fee-bee” song, several of which I recorded here in Ohio.  I analyzed these recordings and found a
statistically significant difference in songs sung from coniferous and
deciduous trees, with the songs sung in conifers being higher in pitch than those
sung from deciduous trees.  More
interestingly, there was a clustering pattern in the pitch of the songs when
they were graphed.  This may indicate
that chickadees can assess the density of the tree around them (taking in factors
such as where they are on the branch: the middle as opposed to the end of a
branch) and then pick a song pitch from a set of pitches that will allow them
to be best heard.

                Due to the nature of the class, my work may never be
published.  However, I feel it would be
inappropriate to keep my research to myself so I decided to post it here since
I have found Ohio birders are often interested in this sort of thing.  If you would like to read my paper (and
perhaps get a clearer understanding of what I found: it is tough to explain
everything in this setting) or if you have any questions about the research that
I did, feel free to shoot me an e-mail at [log in to unmask]  

                On a separate note, a Red-breasted Nuthatch has been
frequenting our feeders around my home in Smithville for a second summer in a
row.  I am not currently at home, but my
parents have been keeping an eye out for any indication that this bird is
actually breeding somewhere nearby, but haven’t even seen as much as second
bird.  It will be interesting to see if
this bird continues to stick around for its summers, seeing as there really isn’t
even any good breeding habitat for this species anywhere around our house.

 

Good Birding!

 

-Ryan Steiner

Smithville, OH






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