African penguins show a form of vocal learning known in only a few animals when they modify their calls to sound like their colony mates.
Alex Wilkins is a writer.
African penguins are at a beach.
The images are from RapidEye.
penguins modify their vocal calls to become more similar to their partners and colony over time, an ability that was previously unknown in only a few species
African penguins were recorded from three different colonies over a three year period to see which penguins were friendly or not.
When penguins are isolated or trying to keep track of their friends, they make certain vocal calls. Four distinct audio signatures were compared to see which one represented the features of the calls. The signatures were similar for penguins that were partners or in the same colony.
It's easier for penguins to find their friends in a colony. Baciadonna says, "Imagine that you are in a pub, you are with your friends and the noise of your environment is really loud." If you want your communication to be more effective, you need to start talking in a certain way.
A key part of vocal learning is the ability to modify calls in response to the environment. Clues for how vocal learning evolved could be provided by identifying which species has vocal accommodations.
Group cohesion and social bonds between penguins can be helped by this accommodation.
The middle pieces to the puzzle of how vocal learning could be evolved are found in this result.
The distance of penguins from humans on the evolutionary tree suggests that vocal accommodation could be common in many species. We don't know if there is a huge variety of different species that are able to modify their vocalisations slightly.
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