Researchers used 20,000 hours of recordings of great tits in Oxford to see how culture changes among populationsWhich songs birds sing can – as with human music – be influenced by age, social interactions and migration, researchers have found.Not all birds learn songs, but among those that do, individuals, neighbourhoods and populations can produce different collections of tunes, akin to different music albums. Continue reading...
A study in Wytham Woods, Oxford, using AI and physical tracking, found that age and migration influence the song repertoires of male great tits. Birds of similar age in a neighborhood tend to sing similar songs, while older birds sing less common, older tunes. New arrivals adopt local songs, and neighborhoods with less migration have more unique songs. Greater movement leads to more common tunes. The findings could potentially be used for bird conservation efforts.
