Biologists first to link bird songs' pitch and volume, providing insight into bird evolution

Biologists at the University of Massachusetts Amherst have released the first broad-scale, comparative, fine-grained analysis linking the amplitude, or volume, of a bird's song to its vocal frequency, or pitch. Though biologists have long wondered whether birds are able to control their pitch as they get louder or if their vocal abilities are mechanically limited, until now there has been no wide-ranging data with which to probe this aspect of the evolutionary history of birdsong.

May 21, 2025 - 15:52
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Biologists at the University of Massachusetts Amherst have released the first broad-scale, comparative, fine-grained analysis linking the amplitude, or volume, of a bird's song to its vocal frequency, or pitch. Though biologists have long wondered whether birds are able to control their pitch as they get louder or if their vocal abilities are mechanically limited, until now there has been no wide-ranging data with which to probe this aspect of the evolutionary history of birdsong.