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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Kirk Roth" data-source="post: 1934565" data-attributes="member: 85015">???  I'm confused by these comments.  You guys do realize that crossbills ARE finches?I would have the opposite expectation in the proposed experiment - that crossbills learn their songs just like other finches.  However, your result would be more interesting, and would lend evidence that perhaps call note specificity had developed for the benefit of crossbills to tell the difference between good and bad potential mates.Which brings me around again to the point I was trying to make above, but apparently failed at: species are defined by who breeds with whom, not who sounds like whom.  Frankly, I wouldn't care what sounds crossbills make, except that there seems to be a correlation between exclusive breeding populations and variability in calls.  But the populations are important here, and whether they tell each other apart by plumage, call type, smell, or ESP, it shouldn't matter so long as the differentiation is real.And while I'm at it, I think its an exaggeration to suggest that the call types can only be distinguished by an elite few researchers.  I can only speak for the American birds, but upslurs vs. downslurs vs. even notes are fairly easy to distinguish.  The highness vs. lowness seems a bit less easy to my untrained ears, but not impossible.  And some, such as the Type 4, are quite distinctive.  Here in the eastern U.S., I've heard Types 1, 2, and 4, and these are distinguishable.  And I'm no Loxiologist by any means...</blockquote>

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