Trill performance components vary with age, season, and motivation in the banded wren.

ABSTRACT: Acoustic displays with difficult-to-execute sounds are often subject to strong sexual selection, because performance levels are related to the sender's condition or genetic quality. Performance may also vary with age, breeding stage, and motivation related to social context. We focused on within-male variation in four components of trill performance in banded wren (Thryophilus pleurostictus) songs: note consistency, frequency bandwidth, note rate and vocal deviation. The latter is a composite measure reflecting deviation from the performance limit on simultaneously maximizing both frequency bandwidth and note rate. We compared the changes in these song parameters at three time scales: over the course of years, across the breeding season, and at different times of the day with contra

SUBMITTER: Vehrencamp SL 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3608479 | biostudies-literature | 2013 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature