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Droughts could change bird songs, creating new species, says study on Darwin’s finches

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In the sunbaked Galápagos Islands, a male finch perches on a branch, hearing what sounds like another bird’s song. But something’s not quite right. The song is slower and simpler, like a familiar tune played at the wrong speed. The bird cocks its head, ruffles its feathers, but stays put. It’s just been fooled by a scientific experiment that’s helping reveal how ecological changes might drive the evolution of new species. A new study published in Science offers insights into how Darwin’s famous finches evolved into different species. The study used an innovative experiment to understand a fundamental question: how do new species form? While the answer is never simple, this research reveals one way it might happen: through small changes in beaks that lead to changes in song, eventually causing birds to no longer recognize each other as the same species. The research began with fieldwork on the Galápagos Islands in 1999, where lead author Jeff Podos, a behavioral ecologist at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, has studied these famous birds, specifically Darwin’s medium ground finch (Geospiza fortis), over many field seasons. https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2024/11/08153158/Darwins-medium-ground-finch-song.wav Song of the Darwin’s medium ground finch (Geospiza fortis). Darwin’s finches helped inspire Darwin’s theory of evolution by natural selection, as their different beak shapes across different Galápagos islands demonstrated how species could adapt to varied food sources over time. Photo of female Darwin’s medium ground finch (Geospiza fortis) courtesy of Andrew Hendry. Despite their historic significance, Darwin’s finches are rather clumsy. “They’re actually terrible flyers,…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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