Female Song in European Starlings: Sex Differences, Complexity, and Composition

Abstract

While male song and its functions have been well studied, female song has often been overlooked. In this study, we provide a detailed description of the spontaneous female song in a well-studied northern temperate songbird, the European Starling (Sturnus vulgaris). We compared the song organization, complexity, and composition of female and male starlings housed in large outdoor aviaries. Overall, the general organization was similar in both sexes, and some females sang complex song bouts of more than 30 seconds of uninterrupted song. Although some females were capable of singing the four phrase-type categories typically found in male song bouts (whistle, variable, rattle, and high-frequency phrase types), a significantly lower proportion of females sang all four categories of phrase type as compared to males. Our results also revealed large individual variation in song characteristics among females: repertoire size varied between 11 and 36 phrase types, while average song bout length ranged between 10 and 26 seconds. All song parameters (total repertoire size, song bout length, and repertoire size within the four different phrase categories) were significantly lower in females than in males. Nevertheless, except for the number of rattle phrase types, song parameters overlapped between the sexes demonstrating that some females produced a more complex song than some males. Canto de la Hembra en Sturnus vulgaris: Diferencias entre Sexos, Complejidad y Composición Resumen. Mientras que el canto del macho y sus funciones han sido bien estudiados, el canto de las hembras ha sido menos estudiado. En este estudio, brindamos una descripción detallada del canto espontáneo de la hembra en una especie bien estudiada de ave canora del norte templado, Sturnus vulgaris. Comparamos la organización del canto, la complejidad y la composición entre machos y hembras en aviarios de gran tamaño emplazados al aire libre. En total, la organización general fue similar en ambos sexos, y algunas hembras cantaron unidades de canto complejas durante más de 30 segundos de modo ininterrumpido. Aunque algunas hembras fueron capaces de cantar las cuatro categorías de tipos de frases típicamente halladas en las unidades de canto de los machos (silbido, variable, matraqueo y tipos de frases de alta frecuencia), una porción significativamente menor de las hembras cantó todas las cuatro categorías de tipos de frases en comparación con los machos. Nuestros resultados también revelaron gran variación individual entre hembras en las características del canto: el tamaño del repertorio varió entre 11 y 36 tipos de frases, mientras que la duración promedio de la unidad de canto fluctuó entre 10 y 26 segundos. Todos los parámetros examinados del canto (tamaño total del repertorio, duración de la unidad de canto y tamaño del repertorio dentro de las cuatro categorías diferentes de frases) fueron significativamente menores en las hembras que en los machos. A pesar de ello, a excepción del número del tipo de frases de matraqueo, los pará metros del canto se superpusieron entre los sexos, implicando que algunas hembras produjeron un canto más complejo que algunos machos.

Estradiol induces region-specific inhibition of ZENK but does not affect the behavioral preference for tutored song in adult female zebra finches

“…However, the lack of a significant main effect of song type in the auditory regions in the present study may be the result of the reduced requirement to detect variations in song in adulthood in this species. The other species in which this phenomenon has been investigated are primarily seasonal breeders, in which the females also sing [7,65,92] and/or male song is variable in adulthood [43,77,85]. Zebra finches, in contrast, are aseasonal, the females do not sing, and male zebra song is stable in adulthood [89].…”

Undirected (Solitary) Birdsong in Female and Male Blue-Capped Cordon-Bleus (Uraeginthus cyanocephalus) and Its Endocrine Correlates

“…Song structure can also be just slightly different between females and males as in European starlings ( Sturnus vulgaris [23], but see [24]) or indistinguishable between sexes, as for instance in the forest weaver ( Ploceus bicolor [25]). …”

Pattern-Induced Covert Category Learning in Songbirds

“…The complex vocalizations (songs) of starlings follow a hierarchical acoustic structure [25-28], with short (200 – 800 ms long) stereotyped patterns of simple notes grouped into “motifs” (e.g., Figures 1B and S1), and longer (~ 1min long) well-defined sequences of motifs organized into bouts[25]. Starling song motifs can be classified by their acoustic characteristics into four species-typical, open-ended, perceptual categories: whistles, warbles, rattles, and high-frequencies[25, 26, 29-31].…”