Potential social facilitation through song in bird communities

Abstract

The main function of birdsong is to attract mates and defend territories among conspecifics, but little is known about the potential of this behavior in generating interactions among co-existing bird species that signal at the same time. Different hypotheses have been put forward to explain the mechanisms that govern signaling in crowded acoustic spaces, including competition for acoustic space, interspecific territoriality, environmental filters, and acoustic social facilitation. We tested these hypotheses in a forest bird community by studying the behavioral, acoustic, and ecological characteristics of 13 co-occurring species. We used passive recordings to assess the magnitude and the determinants of heterospecific song co-occurrence (i.e., when different species sing at the same time and place), and playback experiments to quantify the propensity of birds to sing if stimulated by heterospecific songs. Birds more frequently sang with species with dissimilar songs. In the breeding season, they also actively sang after the playback of other species, especially if these had dissimilar songs, and occasionally after non-avian unfamiliar playbacks. Heterospecific songs may trigger song utterance because they indicate a predator-free environment, or reduce predation risk through dilution effects, and these benefits may be maximized if there is little acoustic similarity. In line with ecological theory on community assembly mechanisms, these results are compatible with limiting similarity (species with similar songs sing at different times) and suggests social facilitation between phenotypically dissimilar species. These potential biotic interactions through songs may represent a mechanism that leads to bird species coexistence and are worth exploring at the community level. Significance statement It is generally assumed that bird species avoid acoustic overlap with birds singing similar songs, but there is also evidence of active interspecific territoriality through song displays between pairs of species. Community-wide responses through songs have never been investigated in birds, and to fill this knowledge gap we performed both observations and experiments on multiple coexisting species. Birds tended to sing with species with more dissimilar songs and they were also actively stimulated to sing when the songs of species with dissimilar songs were played back. An interaction between species with dissimilar songs therefore emerged, potentially yielding anti-predatory benefits. Such active behavior, which would have gone unnoticed if observations only were performed, involves multiple species, and therefore may represent a community-wide mechanism of species coexistence.