Current Science

Open Access Open Access  Restricted Access Subscription Access

Protein-Rich Food Does Not Affect Singing Behaviour and Song Quality in Adult Zebra Finches, Taeniopygia guttata


Affiliations
1 Indo-US Center for Biological Timing, Department of Zoology, University of Delhi, Delhi 110 007, India
 

This study investigated whether short-term protein supplement to the seed-only diet during adulthood would impact the production and song features in male zebra finches (Taeniopygia guttata). In singly housed adult male zebra finches provided daily with seeds as food without or with 1 g of egg white protein supplement (equivalent to ~0.11 g egg proteins) under 12 h light : 12 h dark condition for 8 weeks, we recorded singing pattern at the beginning and end over 2 days when a female conspecific shared his cage. We found no effect of the egg protein supplement on daily song production, song bout duration and motifs per bout as well as the spectral features of the song, viz. motif duration, amplitude, pitch, goodness, mean frequency, frequency modulation, amplitude modulation or entropy. Perhaps, as sexually selected trait, song quality is not directly related to body metabolism. It is likely that seeds provided met energy requirement for vocalization (song production), and so additional egg white protein supplement did not affect the singing behaviour in adult zebra finches.

Keywords

Bird, Food, Protein, Singing, Song, Zebra Finch.
User
Notifications
Font Size

  • Catchpole, C. and Slater, P., Bird Song: Biological Themes and Variations, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, 1995.

  • Holveck, M. J. and Riebel, K., Preferred songs predict preferred males: consistency and repeatability of zebra finch females across three test contexts. Anim. Behav., 2007, 74, 297–309.

  • Kotiaho, J. S., Testing the assumptions of conditional handicap theory: costs and condition dependence of a sexually selected trait. Behav. Ecol. Sociobiol., 2000, 48, 188–194.

  • Gil, D. and Gahr, M., The honesty of bird song: multiple constraints for multiple traits. Trends Ecol. Evol., 2002, 17, 133–141.

  • Smith, S. B., McWilliams, S. R. and Guglielmo, C. G., Effect of diet composition on plasma metabolite profiles in a migratory songbird. Condor, 2007, 109, 48–58.

  • Riebel, K., Song and female mate choice in zebra finches: a review. Adv. Stud. Behav., 2009, 40, 197–238.

  • Alatalo, R. V., Glynn, C. and Lundberg, A., Singing rate and female attraction in the pied flycatcher: An experiment. Anim. Behav., 1990, 39, 601–603.

  • Grava, T., Grava, A. and Otter, K. A., Supplemental feeding and dawn singing in black-capped chickadees. Condor, 2009, 111, 560–564.

  • Berg, M. L., Beintema, N. H., Welbergen, J. A. and Komdeur, J., Singing as a handicap: the effects of food availability and weather on song output in the australian reed warbler Acrocephalus australis. J. Avian. Biol., 2005, 36, 102–109.

  • Barnett, C. A. and Briskie, J. V., Energetic state and the performance of dawn chorus in silvereyes (Zosterops lateralis). Behav. Ecol. Sociobiol., 2007, 61, 579–587.

  • Nowicki, S., Searcy, W. and Peters, S., Brain development, song learning and mate choice in birds: a review and experimental test of the ‘nutritional stress hypothesis’. J. Comp. Physiol. A, 2002, 188, 1003–1014.

  • Alain, J. M., Pinxten, R., Geens, A. and Eens, M., Non-breeding song rate reflects nutritional condition rather than body condition. PLoS ONE, 2012, 7, e36547.

  • Nottebohm, F. et al., Song learning in birds: the relation between perception and production. Philos. T. R. Soc. B, 1990, 329, 115–124.

  • Johnson, F. and Rashotte, M. E., Food availability but not cold ambient temperature affects undirected singing in adult male zebra finches. Physiol. Behav., 2002, 76, 9–20.

  • Ritschard, M. and Brumm, H., Zebra finch song reflects current food availability. Evol. Ecol., 2012, 26, 801–812.

  • Brumm, H., Zollinger, S. A. and Slater, P. J., Developmental stress affects song learning but not song complexity and vocal amplitude in zebra finches. Behav. Ecol. Sociobiol., 2009, 63, 1387–1395.

  • Kriengwatana, B., Wada, H., Schmidt, K., Taves, M., Soma, K. and MacDougall-Shackleton, S., Effects of nutritional stress during different developmental periods on song and the hypothalamic– pituitary–adrenal axis in zebra finches. Hormones Behav., 2014, 65, 285–293.

  • Criscuolo, F., Monaghan, P., Nasir, L. and Metcalfe, N. B., Early nutrition and phenotypic development: ‘catch-up’ growth leads to elevated metabolic rate in adulthood. P. R. Soc. B Biol., 2008, 275, 1565–1570.

  • Atagan, Y. and Forstmeier, W., Protein supplementation decreases courtship rate in the zebra finch. Anim. Behav., 2012, 83, 69–74.

  • Ritschard, M., Riebel, K. and Brumm, H., Female zebra finches prefer high-amplitude song. Anim. Behav., 2010, 79, 877–883.

  • Harper, E., Lambert, L. and Moodie, N., The comparative nutrition of two passerine species: the canary (Serinus canarius) and the zebra finch (Poephila guttata). J. Nutr., 1998, 128, 2684S–2685S.

  • Cook, F. and Briggs, G. M., The nutritive value of eggs. In Egg Science and Technology, McMillan Education, UK, 1986, pp. 141–163.

  • Rao, S. R., Reddy, M. R., Prarharaj, N. K. and Sunder, G. S., Laying performance of broiler breeder chickens fed various millets or broken rice as a source of energy at a constant nutrient intake. Trop. Anim. Health Prod., 2000, 32(5), 329–338.

  • Zann, R. A., The Zebra Finch: A Synthesis of Field and Laboratory Studies, Oxford University Press, 1996.

  • Birkhead, T., Fletcher, F. and Pellatt, E. J., Nestling diet, secondary sexual traits and fitness in the zebra finch. P. R. Soc. B Biol., 1999, 266, 385–390.

  • Williams, T. D., Variation in reproductive effort in female zebra finches (Taeniopygia guttata) in relation to nutrient-specific dietary supplements during egg laying. Physiol. Zool., 1996, 69, 1255–1275.

  • Oberweger, K. and Goller, F., The metabolic cost of birdsong production. J. Exp. Biol., 2001, 204, 3379–3388.


Abstract Views: 192

PDF Views: 73




  • Protein-Rich Food Does Not Affect Singing Behaviour and Song Quality in Adult Zebra Finches, Taeniopygia guttata

Abstract Views: 192  |  PDF Views: 73

Authors

Neelu Anand Jha
Indo-US Center for Biological Timing, Department of Zoology, University of Delhi, Delhi 110 007, India
Vinod Kumar
Indo-US Center for Biological Timing, Department of Zoology, University of Delhi, Delhi 110 007, India

Abstract


This study investigated whether short-term protein supplement to the seed-only diet during adulthood would impact the production and song features in male zebra finches (Taeniopygia guttata). In singly housed adult male zebra finches provided daily with seeds as food without or with 1 g of egg white protein supplement (equivalent to ~0.11 g egg proteins) under 12 h light : 12 h dark condition for 8 weeks, we recorded singing pattern at the beginning and end over 2 days when a female conspecific shared his cage. We found no effect of the egg protein supplement on daily song production, song bout duration and motifs per bout as well as the spectral features of the song, viz. motif duration, amplitude, pitch, goodness, mean frequency, frequency modulation, amplitude modulation or entropy. Perhaps, as sexually selected trait, song quality is not directly related to body metabolism. It is likely that seeds provided met energy requirement for vocalization (song production), and so additional egg white protein supplement did not affect the singing behaviour in adult zebra finches.

Keywords


Bird, Food, Protein, Singing, Song, Zebra Finch.

References





DOI: https://doi.org/10.18520/cs%2Fv111%2Fi10%2F1693-1696