Birdsong is learned, not hardwired, and that means it can change over time, just like human music. But how much can a bird’s song really change in one place?
In this episode, we explore a remarkable long-term study of the Thrush Nightingale, a bird famous for its rich and complex songs. Scientists compared recordings made in the same area of southeastern Finland in 1986 and again in 2019, more than 30 years apart. What they found was surprising.
Over those three decades, every single song type had changed. None of the full song patterns recorded in 1986 were still being sung in 2019. It was a complete musical turnover. And yet, the songs still sounded like Thrush Nightingales. Why? Because while the full songs disappeared, about 40% of the smaller building blocks of song—called syllables—remained the same.
Think of it like music genres: the notes and rhythms may stay familiar, even as entire songs and styles come and go.
The study also found that modern birds sang longer songs but had smaller repertoires, and birds in 2019 shared fewer songs with each other than birds did in 1986. This suggests that changes in population size, window bird feeder, social interaction, or learning opportunities may influence how bird “cultures” evolve over time.
