Richard Bradley

Recording bird songs all around the world has been my passion since childhood. Join me on an audio trip to Australia, Nebraska and Hawaii and listen to some of the birds at each location. We will end our trip in my backyard here in Ohio, where the local songbirds are emphatically greeting spring.

Early in my career as a research biologist, I took a faculty position at the University of Sydney (Australia), where I studied both spider ecology, and bird song. I was fascinated by geographic variation in song, and also the function of female song in the Grey Shrike-thrush (Colluricincla harmonica), a common bird in the open woodlands, heathlands and riparian habitats of Australia.

The author recording (and watching) a Grey Shrike-thrush near the Crommelin Field Station, New South Wales, Australia

A Grey Shrike-thrush captured for banding at the Crommelin Field Station, New South Wales, Australia

The song of the Grey Shrike-thrush (Colluricincla harmonica) contains many whistled phrases and is very sonorous to my ear. Note the specific epithet “harmonica” in the Latin name of this bird that was given by John Latham in 1802, referring to the beautiful song. Much of my research on Grey shrike-thrushes was done with Peter Higgins, and is summarized in the species account in the Handbook of Australian, New Zealand & Antarctic Birds (Higgins & Peter 2002). Our song recordings from around Australia revealed dramatic geographic variation in the songs of these birds. Each individual sings many different motifs, and both males and females sing. Their songs are geographically distinct, somewhat like dialects in human language.

Dawn singing by a Grey Shrike-thrush near Crommelin Field Station, New South Wales, Australia

A color banded male Grey Shrike-thrush singing on his favorite perch. He was at least 10 years old when last seen, defending his original territory. Can you see his color bands on the right leg, red over metal? On the left leg his bands were blue over white, a unique combination for this particular individual.

Listen to an edited audio clip of several different song motifs from a Grey Shrike-thrush. You can also hear the calls of a variety of other Australian birds including the Noisy Friarbird (Philemon corniculatus) heard just as the second shrike-thrush song occurs, and the constant “chips” and “two-note” songs of the White-eared Honeyeater (Nesoptilotis leucotis).

Of course THE iconic bird sound from Australia is that of the Laughing Kookaburra (Dacelo novaeguineae) These birds engage in pre-dawn communal calling that resonates through the bush. This is the largest kingfisher in the world, and their vocalizations are amazingly loud! No wonder it is referred to as “the bushman’s alarm clock.”

chart of times of morning chorus of Laughing Kookaburra

This chart shows the morning chorus times (dots) of the local group of Laughing Kookaburras at the Crommelin Field Station, New South Wales, Australia. Note how the start time changed throughout the year, birds always engaged in their first loud morning chorus just before sunrise (indicated by the solid line). I compiled these data on 45 visits to the field station between 1983 and 1987.

Laughing Kookaburra at Crommelin Field Station, New South Wales, Australia

Listen to the audio clip of a chorus of Laughing Kookaburras, recorded at the Crommelin Field Station, New South Wales, Australia. Does this sound familiar? Don’t these amazing sounds evoke the jungle of your favorite old Tarzan movie? Just think of how many times these birds have played a starring role in movie soundtracks.

Two years ago I traveled to Nebraska in early spring and witnessed one of the amazing wildlife spectacles of North America: The dawn dance of the Sharp-tailed Grouse (Tympanucus phasianellus). These amazing chicken-like birds display in large groups of males early in the morning in prairie grasslands. This type of communal male display ground is called a lek. The females visit the lek and pick the best song-and-dance routine, then mate with that male. For a visual impression of this display watch this video from a cold April morning on the Arrowwood National Wildlife Refuge in North Dakota.

A pair of male Sharp-tailed Grouse displaying on their lek in northern Nebraska.

A male Sharp-tailed Grouse displaying on the lek. The males intensify their dance when a female arrives at the lek.

Listen to an audio clip of the amazing sounds, pops, cooing sounds, tail rattles, and stomping feet of Sharp-tailed Grouse males displaying on a lek. I made these recordings at Calamus Ranch in Nebraska during the early spring 2014. You can also hear the songs of Western Meadowlarks (Sturnella neglecta) in the background (e.g. at 1:10).

This February my travels took me to the islands of Hawaii. I did not bring my professional field recording gear with me, but with modern technology at hand I used my iPhone to record the songs of Apapanes (Himatione sanguinea). This is a remarkable, bright red, Hawaiian Honeycreeper (Family Drepanididae) endemic to Hawaii.

Flock of Apapane singing from the top of a Mamane (Sophora chrysophylla) tree at Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, big island, Hawaii

Listen to this recording of Apapane at Hawaii Volcanoes National Park made with my iPhone.

I enjoy my travels, but nothing makes me feel more at home than the familiar sound of my Ohio backyard birds near Delaware, Ohio. Recently I have recorded the song of a Carolina Wren (Thryothorus ludovicianus) that greets us every morning. This wren is one of the few birds that can be heard singing during the winter in central Ohio.

Carolina Wren near Delaware, Ohio

Listen to this audio clip of the (loud) Carolina Wren accompanied by a number of other birds in the background, such as Northern Cardinals, American Robins, etc.

I enjoy listening to the sounds of birds wherever I go, it is a simple pleasure that enriches my life. I challenge you to go outside and listen!

About the Author: Richard Bradley is Associate Professor emeritus, The Ohio State University. He taught university students for over 30 years at California State University, Long Beach, the University of Sydney (Australia), and The Ohio State University at Marion. His published research includes work on bird song, behavioral ecology of birds and spiders, and population biology of scorpions. He is a research associate of the Borror Laboratory of Bioacoustics and the Acarology Laboratory at the Museum of Biodiversity. In 2013 he published the first comprehensive color guide to the Spiders of North America.

Reference

Higgins, P.J. and J.M. Peter (eds). 2002. Grey Shrike-thrush pp. 1189-1224 In: Handbook of Australian, New Zealand & Antarctic Birds, v 6. Oxford Press, Melbourne.

I have been fascinated with birds ever since I can remember. I grew up in southern California, spending as much time out in nature as possible. As a child I kept pigeons, mostly racing homers and some fancy breeds. It felt right to keep birds that were permitted to fly free. Before long I spent more time looking at the wild birds in my neighborhood. I was soon an active birdwatcher and by age 13 started my ‘life list’ of birds. Now, 53 years later I’m still an active birder and my North American (north of Mexico) life list has grown to 650 species (not counting more than a thousand others seen elsewhere).

photo of Richard Bradley, age 8, holding pigeon

A young pigeon fancier, the author ca 1958.

Along with watching birds, I have always been a fan of listening to them. Any avid birder will tell you, bird-watching is actually 90% bird-listening. Most often how we locate and identify birds. My first sound recorder was an inexpensive open reel tape recorder from Radio Shack, it had 5 inch tape reels and a top recording speed of 3.5 ips (inches per second). Soon I graduated to a used Uher Report Monitor, which was a big step up in acoustical quality.

photo of Richard Bradley with tape recorder

The author with home-made parabolic reflector-mounted microphone and Uher tape recorder ca 1972

When I chose my master’s degree thesis subject in 1972, it had to be bird related. I had worked through high school and college during the summers preparing bird specimens at the Los Angeles County Museum of Natural History. I was also a federally licensed bird bander by the age of 18. I chose to study song dialects. Many birds learn their songs and have culturally-inherited regional dialects, similar to human dialects. I worked with a distinctive salt-marsh inhabiting form of the widespread Savannah Sparrow (Belding’s Savannah Sparrow). It turned out that each of the 14 marsh populations between Santa Barbara California and El Rosario, Baja California (Mexico) had a distinctive vocal dialect (Bradley, 1977). Sixteen years later I returned to document changes in these dialects (Bradley, 1994).

photo of Belding's Savannah Sparrow at Bolsa Chica Lagoon, CA

Belding’s Savannah Sparrow (Passerculus sandwichensis beldingi) Bolsa Chica Lagoon, CA

photo of Richard Bradley recording at Bahía de San Quintín, Baja California Norte, Mexico in 1987

The author recording Belding’s Sparrows at Bahía de San Quintín, Baja California Norte, Mexico in 1987

Audio clip of a few songs of a Belding’s Savannah Sparrow recorded at Upper Newport Bay, CA, in 1973

While working for the Florida State Museum (now Florida Museum of Natural History), I conducted a research project documenting the vocal repertoires and territorial behavior of the White-eyed Vireo (Vireo griseus; Bradley, 1980, 1981). Individual male vireos sing up to 14 different song motifs. Neighboring birds often share a few of their song types. It appeared that young males often learned to copy the songs of their fathers and immediate neighbors.

White-eyed Vireo (Vireo griseus)

Audio clip of four songs of a White-eyed Vireo, two of each of two different motifs. Note a neighboring vireo singing in the background.

Working in the bioacoustics archive I was able to do some really interesting things. One of my tasks was to document the performance of a dance troop composed of indigenous people from southern Mexico.

photo of Voladores performance Gainesville FL 1977

The Danza de los Voladores, Florida State Museum courtyard, October 1977

photo of Richard Bradley recording the performance of the Voladores

The author recording the performance of the Voladores

A short audio clip from the performance of the “Danza de los Voladores,” in the Florida State Museum courtyard, October 1977

I also worked with Steve Nesbitt of the Florida Game and Freshwater Fish Commision (now Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission). He was engaged in a research project to document all the vocalizations of the Sandhill Crane (Grus canadensis). We eventually published a descriptive account of these amazing sounds (Nesbitt & Bradley, 1996). Below you can listen to a short segment of a “unison call” display of a mated pair of these magnificent birds. This recording was made by Lincoln Fairchild and is archived in the Borror Laboratory’s collection (BLB16115).

Sandhill Crane (Grus canadensis)

Audio clip from Lincoln Fairchild’s recording of a pair of Sandhill Cranes performing their unison call.

Throughout my career I made sure that my recordings would be available to other researchers and the public. My early recordings are archived at the Florida Museum of Natural History. I recently donated many of my more recent field recordings to the Borror Laboratory of Bioacoustics. You can listen to them online.

About the Author: Richard Bradley is Associate Professor emeritus, The Ohio State University. He taught at the university level for over 30 years at California State University, Long Beach, the University of Sydney (Australia), and The Ohio State University at Marion. His published research includes work on bird song, behavioral ecology of birds and spiders, and population biology of scorpions. He is a research associate of the Borror Laboratory of Bioacoustics and the Acarology Laboratory at the Museum of Biodiversity. In 2013 he published the first comprehensive color guide to the Spiders of North America.

References

Bradley, R.A 1977. Geographic variation in the song of the Belding’s Sparrow Passerculus sandwichensis beldingi. Bulletin Biological Sciences, Florida State Museum, 22: 57-100.

Bradley, R.A. 1980. Vocal and territorial behavior of the White-eyed Vireo Vireo griseus. Wilson Bulletin, 92: 302-311

Bradley, R.A. 1981. Song variation within a population of White-eyed Vireos (Vireo griseus). Auk, 98: 302-311.

Bradley, R.A. 1994. Cultural change and geographic variation in the songs of the Belding’s Savannah Sparrow (Passerculus sandwichensis beldingi). Bulletin of the Southern California Academy of Sciences, 93(3): 91-109.

Nesbitt, S.A. & R.A. Bradley. 1996. Vocalizations of Sandhill Cranes. Proceedings of the North American Crane Workshop. 7: 29-35.

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Author: Richard Bradley

Travels with a microphone

A Lifelong passion for Birds (and their songs)

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