One song rings out over car alarms
Our home seems to be capturing more urban noise by the month.
Sirens come and go. Motorcycle and truck engines roar past. It’s
the hum of the more urban place Hollister has become.
One song rings out over car alarms
Our home seems to be capturing more urban noise by the month. Sirens come and go. Motorcycle and truck engines roar past. It’s the hum of the more urban place Hollister has become.
Fridays are the worst. As the refuse collection trucks make four passes up and down our street, the auto alarms begin sounding. Frustrated, commuters decide to get an early start and their cars chirp as they disarm those alarms. The din sets dogs to barking and no matter what the clock says, night has ended.
Joining those more urban noises for a while now is a neighbor, a northern mockingbird who sings all night long.
His repertoire gives him away as an older bird, because this individual could only have collected his impressive range of sounds over time.
So in addition to the improvisations and imitations of common back yard birds, this one does a credible red-tailed hawk. Thanks to its choice of residence, it’s collected its own share of urban noise. The bird makes cell phone tones, the sound of a commercial vehicle backing up, the list goes on. And the concert goes on … and on … and on.
I’ve written before about why birds sing. While flocks of small birds will titter back and forth to stay in contact with one another, the kind of singing our nocturnal friend is doing is to maintain control over a territory and attract a mate. Among mockingbirds, mates are thought to select partners based on their vocal capabilities. A good songbook equals a successful bird, one able to avoid predators and find ample food. Thus, a good provider.
But this bird has had me thinking about something else. (What else would anyone think about at 3 a.m.?). How can a bird weighing less than two ounces sing so long, so loud?
While we depend on a structure called a larynx and manipulation of our mouths and lips, Mockingbirds, like other birds, don’t have lips to move around.
Below the larynx in birds is a muscular structure called the syrinx. By manipulating that, the amazing variety of sounds that we all hear can be created. It’s located right where the trachea forks, just above the lungs.
Birds also have much larger lungs, per unit of body weight than mammals typically do.
Still other birds employ resonant structures to amplify their voices. Anyone in the Sierra forest at the right time of year has likely heard the haunting, almost sub-audible booming call of blue grouse.
Next time you hear a mockingbird ring out in the middle of the night, think of what difficulty each of us might have trying to recite the Gettysburg Address without moving our tongues or lips.
I love our neighbor’s song. I just wish it came with an on-off switch.
