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Listening From Inside the Egg
Unhatched chicks seem to recognize the sound of a predator!
© Patrick Kavanagh
Shorebird chicks hatch into a dangerous world, so they need to be vigilant from the start. Researchers in Australia noticed that some shorebird chicks began chirping in their final days in the egg. The chirps fell silent when the researchers played recordings of a Little Raven, which hunts for young birds. The finding suggests the chicks are listening carefully and may be able to tell threatening sounds from non-threatening ones.
BirdNote®
Listening From Inside the Egg
Written by Conor Gearin
This is BirdNote.
[Silver Gull calls, ML 55710851, 1:13-1:16]
Shorebird chicks hatch into a dangerous world. Larger birds would love to turn them into a snack. So they need to be vigilant from the start, emerging with eyes open and walking within a few hours. And scientists are learning that some species may be aware of the outside world while still inside the egg.
[Masked Lapwing calls, ML 280517351, 0:36-0:38]
Researchers in Australia studying Masked Lapwings and Red-capped Plovers, two species of shorebirds, noticed the chicks began chirping in their final days in the egg. They wondered if the chicks would fall silent if their parents left and a predator appeared. They played a recording of Little Ravens, which hunt for young birds, over eggs a few days from hatching.
[Little Raven calls, ML 143149291, 0:07-0:09]
The shorebird embryos made fewer chirps during the raven recording, while adult shorebird alarm calls and white noise had no effect.
[Masked Lapwing juvenile calls, ML 233554, 5:36-5:40]
The finding suggests the chicks are listening carefully and may be able to tell threatening sounds from non-threatening ones. It’s still unknown just how much unhatched birds can learn. Birds as different as gulls, grebes and terns start chirping before they hatch. Future research could reveal just how alert these precocious chicks are within the egg.
[Silver Gull calls, ML 55710851, 1:13-1:16]
For BirdNote, I’m Ariana Remmel.
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Senior Producer: John Kessler
Content Director: Allison Wilson
Producer: Mark Bramhill
Associate Producer: Ellen Blackstone
Managing Producer: Conor Gearin
Bird sounds provided by The Macaulay Library of Natural Sounds at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Ithaca, New York. Silver Gull ML 55710851 recorded by G. Budney, Masked Lapwing ML 280517351 recorded by R. Singal, Little Raven ML143149291 recorded by D. Fleming, and Masked Lapwing ML233554 recorded by T. Baylis.
BirdNote’s theme was composed and played by Nancy Rumbel and John Kessler.
© 2022 BirdNote March 2022 Narrator: Ariana Remmel
ID# egg-09-2022-03-30 egg-09
Reference: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/ibi.12969
Conor Gearin
Writer
