BioAcoustica is a free, open repository of wildlife sound recordings from the Natural History Museum, London.
Taxonomic index of the BioAcoustica collection
Acoustic and biological measurements in the BioAcoustica collection
Recording annotations from ann-o-mate
The specimens that recordings are of, from the collections
Preininger, Doris; Boeckle, Markus; Freudmann, Anita; Starnberger, Iris; Sztatecsny, Marc; Hödl, Walter (2013). Multimodal signaling in the Small Torrent Frog (Micrixalus saxicola) in a complex acoustic environment. Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology, 67(9): 1449 - 1456.
Many animals use multimodal (both visual and acoustic) components in courtship signals. The acoustic communication of anuran amphibians can be masked by the presence of environmental background noise, and multimodal displays may enhance receiver detection in complex acoustic environments. In the present study, we measured sound pressure levels of concurrently calling males of the Small Torrent Frog (Micrixalus saxicola) and used acoustic playbacks and an inflatable balloon mimicking a vocal sac to investigate male responses to controlled unimodal (acoustic) and multimodal (acoustic and visual) dynamic stimuli in the frogs' natural habitat. Our results suggest that abiotic noise of the stream does not constrain signal detection, but males are faced with acoustic interference and masking from conspecific chorus noise. Multimodal stimuli elicited greater response from males and triggered significantly more visual signal responses than unimodal stimuli. We suggest that the vocal sac acts as a visual cue and improves detection and discrimination of acoustic signals by making them more salient to receivers amidst complex biotic background noise.
| Micrixalus saxicola |
Where the specimens that recordings are of were collected, not where the sound was recorded