Sierra Nevada Aquatic Research Laboratory

03 Jun, 08 AM - 13 Jun, 08 AM

Bird song is a widely studied behavior that is assumed to incur energetic costs but these costs have been assessed for only a few species and the relevant studies may suffer from a number of limitations. Previous research on energetic costs of song in songbirds (oscines) has quantified direct levels of gas exchange in CO2 and O2. These evaluations require the birds to be in small (restricting air chambers) and/or harnessed with gas masks and wires. With these various invasive procedures, the results have been conflicting at best. My proposed project will take a different and less invasive approach by assessing the relative energy invested in singing. By using sensitive audio and video equipment it is possible to calculate the energy of each song and the effort for the song spread display that accompanies it. With this information we can use other features of song bouts (e.g. latency, switching rate, bout size, etc.) to estimate the relative cost of each song and how physically taxing singing really is. Brown-headed Cowbirds are one of the most widely studied species in research on bird song. Due to the wide base of knowledge on cowbirds, as well as their moderately sized song repertoires, and highly social nature, they are an ideal model organism for this study. My activities while based at SNARL will consist of trapping cowbirds that will be brought back to the UCSB aviary for testing. Most or all of this trapping will take place in the Mammoth flight whistle dialect our group has studied since 1978 near the town of Mammoth Lakes. Trapped birds will be kept in outdoor cages at SNARL until a sample of 20-30 has been acquired, which should be about two weeks (two 10 day stints). After testing at UCSB for 1-3 weeks, birds will be returned to the area and released at their capture sites. In addition to my energetic studies, my research activities will also generate valuable data for a study that my research group is doing on temporal changes versus stability in the Mammoth and Convict Creek cowbird flight whistle dialects that have been under study since 1978.

Visit #21295 @Sierra Nevada Aquatic Research Laboratory

Approved

Under Project # 21685 | Research

Song Energetics in Brown-headed Cowbirds

graduate_student - University of California, Santa Barbara

Reservation Members(s)

Devin Zaratzian Jun 3 - 13, 2010 (11 days)
Devin Zaratzian Jun 3 - 13, 2010 (11 days)

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Dorm 2 Jun 3 - 13, 2010