[obol] Interesting Article On "Spshing"

[Cindy Ashy]

Maybe this is old hat to some of you but over the years I have asked several
expert birders, including a couple who were also biology professors, why
pshishing works. Most of the time, I got back the "it just does and we don't
care why" sort of answer and then a few explanations that made absolutely no
sense to me. I stumbled on this article this evening that seems quite
convincing: http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=432544
(spelled Spshing in this article).

Briefly, it has to do with this sound mimicing the sound species make to each
other within mixed species non-breeding flocks (and that these species respond
more to "general" sounds"). Only works on new world passerines that join mixed
species flocks in the non-breeding season and not on those that do not join
mixed flocks and not on old world passerines that do not join mixed flocks. The
author also describes the difference in the behavior of birds that respond to
spshing and to squeaks (I guess like those squeaky Audubon thingies that have
never worked for me....although I did have a neighborhood Barred Owl that would
respond to a certain trilly pattern I can make with a hand-made clay ocarina)

Note that the author, Neal Griffith Smith, is the same guy who painted the eye
rings on Thayer's and Herring Gulls to test if this was the reproductive
isolating mechanism between them (since they overlapped in range, were very
closely related, looked similar, exhibited similar calls and courtship
behavior, yet did not hybridize frequently)....I've been told his results were
controversial but I find them fascinating....the males who were already paired
would no longer copulate with their female partner when the color of her
eyerings were changed and females would choose to pair with the wrong species
when the eyerings of the wrong species were painted to match her own.

Cindy Ashy


 
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