Is Morphometry an Indicator of the Number of Sexy Syllables in the Song of Yellow-Fronted Canary (Serinus mozambicus)?

Adoté Hervé Gildas Akueson,Arcadius Yves Justin Akossou,Ayédèguè Eustache Alaye

doi:10.3390/d13110542

Abstract

Birds use song for several goals as defending territory, alerting a partner to the presence of a predator, or wooing a female for breeding. This study aims to identify the morphometric parameters which determine the variability of the number of syllables in the “sexy” songs of yellow-fronted canary. For this purpose, sixteen morphometric parameters were measured among 170 yellow-fronted canaries captured, in four agroecological zones in North Benin. The results showed that the morphometry of yellow-fronted canary varies according to its habitat and the type of song. The categorization of the sample studied allowed to retain two groups which differ in the importance of body characters and the number of sexy syllables issued when singing. Yellow-fronted canaries from the Sudanese climate zone not only have superior morphometric characters compared to other zones, but also have a song composed of several different sexy syllables. A binary logistic regression model with selection of variables revealed that the index of beak shape, abdomen length, and tail length are the determining characteristics of the number of sexy syllables. These results are needed for future breeding and conservation studies of the species.

Highlights

Birds have always had a privileged place with man, being appointed as signs of elevation and connected with the divine according to Platon [1]
Markowitz et al [6] showed in canaries (Serinus canaria), a closely related species to yellow-fronted canary, that their song is subdivided into phrases and syllables
The results obtained in this study showed the effect of the environment and the morphological characters of the yellow-fronted canary on the number of sexy syllables emitted in its song

Summary

Introduction

Birds have always had a privileged place with man, being appointed as signs of elevation and connected with the divine according to Platon [1]. They are real initiation tools for learning about wildlife [2] and good environmental indicators for ecological diagnostics [3]. In many species of songbirds or Passeriformes, including yellow-fronted canary, the song behavior is produced both to defend either a territory and to attract a partner. The song of the yellow-fronted canary is made up of notes, which together form syllables. Sexy syllables are bipartite syllables linked to a “two-voice” phenomenon composing the “sexy”

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