Why Do Birds Sing? by Dr Grainne Cleary

Why Do Birds Sing? follows on from Dr Grainne Cleary’s best seller Why do Birds do that? In her new book she takes a deep dive into just one aspect of bird behaviour, their song, and has come up with many amazing and often surprising answers.

While it is a scholarly book in which she has drawn on birdsong research as far back as that done by pioneers such as Daines Barrington (1727-1800) until today, she uses accessible language which the general reader can understand and enjoy, although occasionally it took me some time to get my head around a scientific term.

Her book is divided into eight sections, and each is further sub divided into short chapters in a question-and-answer format.

As I leafed through it, I was immediately drawn in by the quirky chapter headings e.g.

Do birds gossip before going to sleep?

Did birds get their brains from dinosaurs?

Why do ravens yell?

Why do birds not fall out of trees when they sleep?

Can deaf birds sing?

Why do female fairy-wrens sing to their eggs?

I soon became deeply absorbed in this compelling and informative book and learnt a great deal about birdsong as I read. I was surprised to discover that songbirds have more in common with us humans than I had imagined when I read how young birds learn their song by listening and remembering the sounds produced by their parents in the same way human infants learn to talk.

And that, in the same way as we humans vary our speech, depending on with whom we are communicating, birds also use different songs and calls, and different pitch, tone and volume to fit different circumstances.

In the last section of her book, she explores how bird brains and human brains are similar. And how bird brains can help us to understand conditions like Alzheimer’s disease, Dyslexia and Traumatic brain injury in humans. She herself has dyslexia and an expressive language disorder (speech impairment) and she now understands what is going on in her own brain which must come as a great relief.

When I woke up this morning, I could hear the rumbling sound of motorway traffic in the distance and then, closer at hand, the sound of a bird singing in our garden. I could easily identify it by its song, but who taught it to sing, why was it singing, who was it singing to, and what was its song about? The answers to questions like this, and to many more about birdsong, are in her book.

Just a small criticism, I was disappointed that New Zealand birds, and the considerable amount of research pertaining to birdsong that has been done in this country about species such as tui, bellbird, saddleback and rifleman, did not rate a mention.

Bird lovers who read this book will find the answers to any questions they might have about birdsong in there and will find it a compelling read. It will undoubtedly deepen their appreciation and understanding of just how magical and complex birdsong is as they listen to the birds singing in their own backyard, or while out walking in the bush.

Reviewer: Lyn Potter

Allen & Unwin