The Beauty of Birdsong
Meet Your Lyrical Neighbors
There’s a light-post that towers over my neighbor’s yard. Fifteen feet tall, it’s a nightmare to change a bulb in, though George has a pretty ingenious way of doing it. From my open kitchen window, the fixture stands like a sentinel, peering over the tall hedge row between our houses.
At night it does its job flooding light throughout the neighborhood, exposing any would be-miscreants within a fifty-meter radius. Come morning though, it sits idly, gleaming in the sun, its metallic body reflecting a different light as it eagerly awaits the night. An impatient timer no doubt hiding amongst the metal, ticking ever closer to “on”.
Though dormant come day, it’s far from useless in its idle hours. What serves as a home security measure to George at night has an entirely different use to my other neighbors, as evidenced by the squiggles of bird poop atop the shade.
A light-post to some, a podium to others.
From my seat at the kitchen table I watch clouds roll lazily into view, sliding behind the post before exiting the window frame like a moving picture.
Every day the pole is greeted by neighborhood birds, all taking a turn to sing or call out a warning. It is mating season after all and they’re primed and ready to belt it out. In the breeze they wobble back and forth, tipping their tails in search of balance.
Though the post is a prime spot to sing from, it’s far from the only one available. Bird calls sift through my window screen from all directions. A mockingbird perched on an impossibly skinny branch shows off its memory and range, carrying on like an over-caffeinated opera singer. Mourning doves and their sorrowful hymns mix with the sharp hits of blue jays and the shrill trills of common grackles. White ibis murmur to themselves like grumpy old men as they probe the grass below European starlings that dart across the sky. Within just a few minutes I’m able to identify more than 10 different species without ever moving from my seat.
Bird calls and songs are something we hear every day. Like the hum of refrigerators and air conditioners, they fade into the drone of traffic in urban areas; a phenomenon that causes urban birds to sing louder than their rural cousins. But, upon closer inspection of these vocals we find something truly incredible.
You might think birds have vocal cords like our own, and you would be right, to an extent. They do have vocal cords like us, only theirs are much more sophisticated. If you’ve ever tried to mimic a bird call, you’d know this to be true. Whereas we have a larynx (vocal cords) located at the top of our windpipe (trachea), they have what’s called a syrinx, located at the bottom of the windpipe where it splits to the lungs. Being situated there allows for them to have a double-barreled vocal set up, as the syrinx splits on to the bronchi of each lung. This extremely unique adaptation allows some birds to create two completely different sounds at the exact same time.
When you pair this instrument with their hyper-efficient lungs you get an unbelievable, air sculpting machine. The northern cardinal, for instance, is capable of running “through more notes than are on a piano keyboard in just a tenth of a second.” Male northern mockingbirds can learn as many as 200 different songs throughout their lives. A canary may take up to 30 mini-breaths per second allowing it to continuously sing for several minutes at a time.
As if flying wasn’t cool enough. We can barely walk and talk at the same time.
When it comes to the attractiveness of bird song, beauty may be in the eardrum of the beholder. From the screech of a grackle to the melody of a mockingbird, a love song to some may be an enemy to others. These songs and the way they mix in the air are never quite the same. They change with the rhythms of the earth as new migratory species enter and exit the fray, and new seasons waft in on the breeze. As the world turns like a record, so too do the songs being played.
In times of difficulty we often draw together, living our lives with hopefully just a little more compassion. After nearly two years of avoiding eye contact, it was Hurricane Irma that would ultimately introduce me to my neighbor George, someone I’ve grown immensely close with ever since.
Now, with the oppressive din of coronavirus fears that seems to dominate our lives, we’re forced to keep our human neighbors and friends at an awkward distance. So why not turn to our other neighbors. The ones we’ve dismissed for so long.
Sitting and listening to this chorus from my kitchen window, it’s nice to feel some sense of normalcy amongst the backdrop of unrest. With all the chaos in the world, they go about theirs lives unaffected, flitting by our panicked TV screens on their way to the next lamp post.
If you’re staying at home, or even if you’re not, take a minute to meet your winged neighbors. You may just make a new friend.
Besides, it’s unlikely they’ll let you get closer than 6 feet from them anyways.
For a much more eloquent and detailed take on bird song please read this essay by author David G. Haskell and for tips on exploring these songs follow this link.
