“This is a video showcasing a collection of 50 different Black-naped Oriole (Oriolus chinensis) calls/songs. It is compiled from my video clips and audio recordings collected since 2009.
“I had sometime ago documented a collection of 16 differents calls LINK. The latest compilation includes these calls, most of which with improved samples.
“The video proper begins with 2 different hissing alert/warning calls. From my observations, these are meant for the fledglings or juvneiles rather than intruders. During the period when I was obseving their nesting activities just below the nest, not once did they vocalise these calls. It was only one or two weeks after the chicks fledged, when I began to hear them LINK 1 and LINK 2.
“The next call is that of the fledglings. They chirp practically non-stop from morning till evening. They are still dependent on the parents to feed them. This enable the parents to locate them quickly.
“The rest are territorial/courtship calls. I have sorted them, in a non-scientific way, by the number of ‘syllables’ in ascending order. They range from 1 to a maximum of 5. Some of the calls begin with a common syllable that sound like gig (as in giggle). Sometimes the gig is hardly audible – drowned in environmental noises.
“All the recordings were done in my condo. I hear the birds vocalising very frequently. However, I have only managed to sight the orioles vocalising 6 of these calls in video. The rest are audio clips dubbed on video clips of mostly other bird behaviours.”
Sun Chong Hong
Singapore
30th July 2012
