Occurrence and life history correlates of vocal duetting in North American passerines

Abstract

Vocal duetting, where two birds produce temporally coordinated vocalizations, has been reported in a taxonomically and geographically diverse set of avian species. Researchers have suggested a number of potential correlates of duetting, including long term monogamy, year-round territory defense and sexual plumage monomorphism. Because the majority of duetting species are tropical, they have been the focus of the most comprehensive studies to date. There is, therefore, a real need for data regarding avian duets in temperate species. I used the recently completed Birds of North America species reports to examine the frequency, evolutionary origins and potential life history correlates of duetting behavior in North American passerines. ''Duetting'' behavior was reported in 7% of species from 12 avian families, likely representing 17 separate evolutionary origins. Duetting species showed apparent long term monogamy and year-round territoriality at frequencies more than double those of non-duetting passerines: 65% of duetting species were long term monogamous, compared to 27% of non-duetting species, and 50% of duetting species defended the same territory throughout the year, compared with only 11% of non-duetting species. Duetting and non-duetting species showed statistically indistinguishable frequencies of sexual plumage monomorphism. Comparative analyses of duetting species and their sister taxa revealed that the shift to duetting is accompanied by a gain of long term monogamy and year-round territoriality more often than it is associated with a loss of those traits. This study provides intriguing summary evidence that selective factors promoting duetting may be associated with a sedentary, monogamous lifestyle, and may operate similarly across taxonomic groups. Furthermore, vocal duetting may be considerably more common among temperatezone species than previously recognized.

Angry Birds Need Not Apply: A Perspective on the Flexible form and Multifunctionality of Avian Vocal Duets

“…We report those data, along with rates of duet multi functionality in Table . As a rough control for phylogenetic effects, we also report data broken down by family, as duets are thought to have arisen independently in each family (Benedict ). Each family was assigned the trait shown by the majority of species within the family.…”

“…Several life‐history characteristics have influenced the formation of functional hypotheses regarding avian duets. These include primarily sedentary lifestyles, monogamy (Farabaugh ; Benedict ; Price ), and the fact that duets are always given by members of a mated pair or other cooperative social group. These characteristics led early duet researchers to conclude that duet singers coordinate their vocal outputs as a cooperative signal benefitting the interests of both partners (Wolf ; Serpell ; Short & Horne ).…”

“…Evidence of mate‐guarding spurred a series of studies looking for duets representing either conflict or cooperation. Most recently, work is moving away from viewing this as a dichotomy, as researchers recognize that many duets may be used in both types of situations (Benedict ; Mennill & Vehrencamp ).…”

“…At larger levels, variations in evolutionary history and ecology may make patterns less consistent, and we expect that some of the extensive structural variation found in duets is likely due in part to taxonomic diversity (Ryan & Brenowitz ; Hall ). Simultaneously we expect that species‐specific duet features are shaped by ecological and life‐history traits in accordance with their evolutionary history (Farabaugh ; Benedict ; Hall ; Mann et al. ), and that across species, duet form will show predictable features.…”

Small Song Repertoires and High Rate of Song-Type Sharing among Canyon Wrens

“…The Canyon Wren is closely related to the Rock Wren yet apparently differs greatly in song behavior (Kroodsma 1977, Mann et al 2006. patterns suggest that ecological and social factors may be more important than evolutionary history in shaping song behavior (Benedict 2008). for example, sexual selection may promote a large repertoire via female choice, particularly in polygynous species or in species that frequently switch mates (Catchpole 1987, but see Byers and Kroodsma 2009).…”