Bird watch

A bird clock is the approximate chronological sequence of bird calls of different species, with which a rough estimate of the time is possible based on the respective song or call . The bird clock is based on the fact that different species of birds start singing at different times in the early morning hours. A certain range in the course of the morning twilight is a specific incentive for individual species of songbirds .

When a species of bird begins to sing is strongly influenced by the ambient brightness and thus by the time of sunrise , which in turn depends on the season and geographical location.

Graphic representations of a bird watch can often be found on educational forest or nature trails .

Biological importance

Birdsong has an exogenous rhythm that depends on the time of year and time of the day on environmental stimuli, in particular on brightness, warmth and noises - this can include the voices of other birds. The singing of the birds serves on the one hand to demarcate the territory and on the other hand to attract the female. Singing as social behavior is to be understood from two different perspectives - the singing bird thus represents territorially the claim to an area and generatively the option for a partner. The strength, duration, repetition and variation of a singing can vary depending on the state of the bird and the circumstances of its territory vary and in this way also reflect current conditions for a possible breeding business.

Singing at special times enables better localization of different individuals of the respective species. The spatial allocation of the singing of a certain male bird within a species becomes clearer if his voice is not lost in the choir of some other, but can be heard in competition with similar ones.

Example of a bird watch

The following list shows the beginning of the singing of various songbirds in a sequence similar to that of the Swiss plateau . The approximate times are relative to the sunrise and can vary depending on the weather, season, region and habitat.

time	bird	singing
-90 min.	Black redstart
-75 min.	Song thrush
-60 min.	blackbird
-50 min.	robin
-40 min.	Wren
-30 min.	Chaffinch
-10 min.	Chiffchaff
- 5 min.	Great tit
sunrise
+ 5 min.	Blackcap
+15 min.	Goldfinch
+30 min.	Greenfinch