Wren songs

A male Carolina Wren has a repertoire of about 30 songs. It sings one song a number of times before switching to another, known as eventual variety. (May, PA)










(June, PA)










The song can be confused with that of Kentucky Warbler. The Kentucky usually only sings every 15 seconds or so (except at dawn) and each male has only one song (May, NJ)











Carolina Wren pair duet, with a female chattering over the male's song. The recording begins with scolding by the female. (Jan, PA)











Odd song variants:
(May, NJ)









(Mar, PA)











In this example a paired male is singing with (mostly) immediate variety, and interspersing squeaky notes between the phrases (7.32am, Feb, PA).






House Wrens also each have a repertoire of about 30 songs.
(5.45am, June, PA)










Most Winter Wrens in the eastern United States sing only two different songs, albeit amazingly long and complicated vocalizations (Western birds, now split and called the Pacific Wren, have a larger repertoire).
(July, ME)


Time scale reduced on these three sonagrams.
phrases 1,2 and 3








phrases 4,5 and 7 are a short version of the next song







phrases 6,8,9 and 10










The eastern Marsh Wren has a repertoire of 40-50 songs. Western Marsh Wrens have a much larger repertoire and may be a different species - see Kroodsma. Consecutive songs are all different, known as immediate variety.
(May, NJ)





















(Aug, NJ)












Sedge Wrens have a huge song repertoire, with each male having 200-300 versions, mostly subtle differences in the chatter. What is really interesting about the North American population is that the songs are improvised, not learned.
(June, ND)