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Article: Birdie talk.(SCIENCE)(bird songs)(Brief article)
- Article from:
- WR News, Edition 3 (including Science Spin)
- Article date:
- January 9, 2009
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2009 Weekly Reader Corp. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Listen up! Baby birds have something to say, and researchers are all ears.
A team of experts recently figured out that baby birds babble before they learn how to sing. To babble is to make sounds that have no meaning. Human babies babble while learning to talk.
Researchers studied the bird brains of baby zebra finches as the little animals learned how to sing. According to zebra finch experts, the baby birds begin making noises about three days after being born. The soft noises are ff ff sounds, experts say.
"Birds start out by babbling, just as humans do," says researcher Michale S. Fee.
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