Yellow Warbler.
While walking in the woods today, listening to the songs of Eastern Wood-pewees, I got to thinking about bird brains.
If you haven’t heard a pewee sing, you’re missing out. The song is wistful, pensive, slow, intermittent, and takes a good while to complete. It begins with a slurred “Pee-oh-wee”—and the pause that follows makes you think, Simple enough. Then after ten or fifteen seconds, you hear a second “Pee-oh-wee!” just like the first. Well, that’s the song, you think. That’s the sum of it. But no. Although what follows another 10 or 15 seconds later is a third call like the first two, but after the third pause, you hear: “Peee-ohh!”
This bird has a lazy, languid, four-part song that lasts a good 40 or 45 seconds.
Somehow it keeps track. Something about this bird’s brain causes it to stretch out its delivery, to hint at false assurances before revealing a final surprise.
Ospreys building a nest atop the Rockland Fire Station.
Every creature experiences life differently. Dogs smell the world as we cannot. Bats echolocate. Octopi are astonishingly intelligent but experience a wholly different reality. And birds have magnets in their heads—or GPS devices (or somesuch) that let them geolocate with impressive precision.
But it’s the songs of birds that most fascinate me, that make me think about their brains. Many (most?) sing more than one tune—like today’s Chestnut-sided Warblers, alternately singing Type 1 and Type 2 songs. The voices of Savannah Sparrows and Black-billed Cuckoos seem so soft and subtle and tenuous but cover impressively great distances.
Birdsong. So varied and complex. I wonder if the human brain is even capable of decoding the cipher.
Beech Hill List
Beginning at 7:45 a.m., I hiked all trails.
1. Wild Turkey (v)
2. Red-eyed Vireo**
3. Ovenbird
4. Black-throated Green Warbler (v)
5. Chestnut-sided Warbler**
6. Common Yellowthroat (v)
7. Brown-headed Cowbird (v)
8. Northern Cardinal** (v)
9. Eastern Towhee
10. American Redstart (v)
11. Scarlet Tanager (v)
12. Pileated Woodpecker (drumming)
13. Blue Jay** (v)
14. Alder Flycatcher
15. Black-capped Chickadee
16. White-breasted Nuthatch (v)
17. Gray Catbird*
18. Song Sparrow
19. Yellow Warbler**
20. American Goldfinch (v)
21. Tree Swallow
22. Red-tailed Hawk
23. Eastern Phoebe*
24. Savannah Sparrow
25. Field Sparrow (v)
26. Chipping Sparrow* (v)
27. American Robin*
28. Hermit Thrush (v)
29. Eastern Wood-pewee
Elsewhere
30. House Finch (v)
31. Mourning Dove (v)
32. European Starling
33. Osprey
v = Voice only
*Also elsewhere
**Voice only elsewhere
Tags: alder flycatcher, American goldfinch, American redstart, American robin, black-capped chickadee, black-throated green warbler, blue jay, brown-headed cowbird, chestnut-sided warbler, chipping sparrow, common yellowthroat, eastern phoebe, eastern towhee, eastern wood-pewee, European starling, field sparrow, gray catbird, hermit thrush, house finch, mourning dove, northern cardinal, osprey, ovenbird, pileated woodpecker, red-eyed vireo, red-tailed hawk, savannah sparrow, scarlet tanager, song sparrow, tree swallow, white-breasted nuthatch, wild turkey, yellow warbler
