The signal value of matched singing in great tits: evidence from interactive playback experiments

Male songbirds engaged in song duels can interactively vary a number of aspects of their song output to match one another. Evidence is presented from playback experiments that allow interactive signalling between the experimenter and territorial male great tits, Parus major. There were two main results. First, the singing behaviour elicited by interactive playback differed from that elicited by non-interactive (loop) playback, but measures of approach response showed no significant difference. Second, the changes in singing behaviour were consistent with the idea that matching provides successively more precise indications of the intended receiver, from relatively imprecise when just matching song type, to very precise when matching song type, strophe length and delay.

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