Join BirdNote tomorrow, November 30th!
Illustrator David Sibley and actor H. Jon Benjamin will face off in the bird illustration battle of the century during BirdNote's Year-end Celebration and Auction!
Hear White-throated Sparrows Learning to Sing
Practice makes perfect!
© Laura Wolf
The White-throated Sparrow’s melancholy whistle is hauntingly beautiful. But when you hear an adult sparrow performing, just know that the bird wasn’t always an expert singer. In the fall, listen for White-throated Sparrows rehearsing their song. Inexperienced young birds sometimes begin with disorganized jumbles of notes known as sub-songs. As winter deepens, the first-year birds begin to get the syllables of their songs down, but they might sound shaky and off-key. But by summer, hopefully, all the new adult birds will be virtuosos.
BirdNote®
Hear White-throated Sparrows Learning to Sing
Written by Conor Gearin
This is BirdNote.
[White-throated Sparrow song, ML 98808]
The White-throated Sparrow’s melancholy whistle is hauntingly beautiful. Some birders remember the syllables of the tune as “Old Sam Peabody, Peabody, Peabody.”
[White-throated Sparrow song, ML 98808]
But when you hear an adult sparrow performing, just know that the bird wasn’t always an expert singer. In the fall, listen for White-throated Sparrows rehearsing their song. Inexperienced young birds, hatched during the preceding summer months, sometimes begin with disorganized jumbles of notes known as sub-songs.
[White-throated Sparrow, ML 181988611, 0:33-0:35]
As winter deepens, the first-year birds begin to get the syllables of their songs down, but they might sound shaky and off-key.
[White-throated Sparrow, ML 376949101, 0:08-0:11]
Any musician knows that sometimes you have to mess up over and over until you get it just right.
[White-throated Sparrow, ML 246111811, 0:09-0:12]
In the spring, you might hear some over-excited hiccups…
[White-throated Sparrow, ML 225810341, 0:20-0:22]
But by summer, hopefully, all the new adult birds will be virtuosos, confidently joining the other mature sparrows and making it all sound easy:
[White-throated Sparrow song, ML 98808]
For BirdNote, I’m Michael Stein.
###
Senior Producer: Mark Bramhill
Producer: Sam Johnson
Content Director: Jonese Franklin
Bird sounds provided by The Macaulay Library of Natural Sounds at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Ithaca, New York. White-throated Sparrow ML 98808 recorded by G.A. Keller, White-throated Sparrow ML 181988611 recorded by V. Heemstra, White-throated Sparrow ML 376949101 recorded by P. Hawrylyshyn, White-throated Sparrow ML 246111811 recorded by S. Kinsley, and White-throated Sparrow ML 225810341 recorded by T. Sturm.
BirdNote’s theme was composed and played by Nancy Rumbel and John Kessler.
© 2022 BirdNote September 2022/October 2024 Narrator: Michael Stein
ID# song-17-2022-09-22 song-17
Conor Gearin
Writer
Michael Stein
NarratorSights & Sounds
Related Field Notes
Male Marsh Wrens will build several--as many fifteen--dome shaped shells in the reeds to woo fema
The Osprey is the only North American raptor to eat fish almost exclusively, and it's well adapte