zebra finch

Monitoring Pacific Walrus: With the end of summer fast approaching, US Geological Survey (USGS) researchers are once again gearing up to radio-tag walruses on Alaska’s northwestern coast as part of the agency’s ongoing study of how the marine mammals are coping with declining sea ice. “Sea ice is an important component in the life cycle of walruses.  These tracking studies…

The male zebra finch (Taeniopygia guttata) learns to sing in private before performing for a female audience, according to Satoshi Kojima and Allison J. Doupe from the University of California, San Francisco. In addition, juvenile male finches seem to step up the quality of their singing, despite their immaturity, when in the presence of potential mates. As described in the…

In an article published earlier this week in Nature, researchers revealed the complete genome of the zebra finch and focused on the intricacies of their vocal communication. The zebra finch, the males of which are known to learn and repeat the same song generation after generation, show 800 active genes involved in vocalization. One group of researchers, however, found more…