Jill's Pick from Around the World: Bird "sings" through feathers


Video credit: National Geographic


Welcome to the new weekly installment of Jill's Pick from Around the World. Each week Jill Weislo, Wild New Jersey webmaster, will select a unique wildlife story from around the globe.

New Jersey's common yellowthroat has a lovely, soothing warble, but that songbird has nothing on the club-winged manakin of South America. Solving a longstanding puzzle among bird experts, scientists have found that the sharp, violin-like sounds of the club-winged manakin come not from the beak but from a suite of specially evolved, vibrating feathers. A new study offers the first hard evidence that birds use feathers for audible communication as well as for flight and warmth.


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Posted by WILDNEWJERSEY at 12/22/2009 12:00 PM
Categories: Jill's Pick from Around the World
Tags: vibrations Andean Cloud Forest south america club-winged manakin
 

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