If you’ve ever been outside at night and heard an eerie, human-like whistling sound, you may have wondered what bird makes that noise. The likely culprit is one of a few bird species with an exceptional ability to mimic sounds, including the Northern Mockingbird, Brown Thrasher, and Lyrebird.
If you’re short on time, here’s a quick answer to your question: The birds most likely to whistle like humans at night are the Northern Mockingbird, Brown Thrasher, and Lyrebird. Their incredible mimicry skills allow them to copy almost any sound they hear, from other birds to man-made noises.
In this article, we’ll explore the top bird species that are adept vocal mimics and describe why they use this ability to whistle like people. We’ll also discuss how and when you’re most likely to hear their human-like vocalizations in the night.
The Northern Mockingbird: A True Mimic Expert
Range and Habitat: Where It’s Found
The Northern Mockingbird is a medium-sized songbird with gray upperparts and white underparts. It is found in open areas across much of the contiguous United States, southern Canada, Mexico, parts of Central America, and the Caribbean.
Mockingbirds prefer habitats with dense shrubbery and thickets, such as forest edges, overgrown fields, parks, and residential areas. They are adaptable birds that thrive in both rural and urban environments.
According to the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, the Northern Mockingbird has one of the largest ranges of any North American bird. Its breeding range covers much of the Lower 48 states, except for the Pacific Northwest, northern New England, and the northern Great Plains.
The species winters as far north as Pennsylvania and Oregon, and can be found year-round across the southern half of the U.S. from California to Florida.
Mockingbirds are non-migratory in the southern parts of their range. But northern populations migrate south for the winter. Their wintering grounds reach south to Mexico, the Caribbean islands, and Central America.
The mockingbird’s ability to adapt to human-modified environments has allowed it to expand its range dramatically over the past 200 years.
Exceptional Vocal Mimicry: How and Why It Whistles
The Northern Mockingbird is renowned for its amazing ability to mimic vocalizations of other birds and sounds from its environment. This versatile songster can whistle, squeak, meow, bark, and even imitate mechanical noises.
Male mockingbirds have a complex repertoire of songs and calls that they use to defend their territory and attract mates. Their vocal mimicry likely evolved to impress prospective females. By mimicking sounds, a male mockingbird can signal that it is an experienced adult with strong learning skills that would pass to its offspring.
Mockingbirds often sing more at night during breeding season, especially when the moon is full or nearly full. Increased nocturnal singing may help the birds better defend their nesting territories when vision is limited.
The eerie whistles, chuckles, and gurgles mockingbirds produce at night can sound like human vocalizations to the imaginative ear.
A mockingbird may pick up snatches of songs from 20 or 30 other species of birds throughout its life. In one study published in The Auk journal, a single mockingbird was documented imitating the songs of 43 distinct bird species, along with frog croaks and squeaking barn doors!
Next time you hear a Northern Mockingbird sing at night, listen closely to pick out which birds, animals, or sounds it is mimicking in its skilled voice.
The Vocal Powers of the Brown Thrasher
Habitat and Distribution: Where It Lives
The brown thrasher (Toxostoma rufum) is a common songbird found throughout much of the eastern and central United States. This medium-sized bird prefers living in shrublands, forest edges, thickets, overgrown fields, parks, and suburban yards.
Its habitat range spans across the country, from southern Ontario to central Texas to the east coast. The brown thrasher has proven to be an adaptable species as human development has altered its natural habitat over time.
According to Audubon’s climate threat map (Audubon 2023), the current summer range of the brown thrasher covers 28 U.S. states. Experts predict that number to decrease over the next few decades if conservation efforts are not made for the species as the climate changes.
Expert Mimicry Skills: Its Unusual Whistling
The brown thrasher is best known for its beautiful and extensive song repertoire. Of all North American songbirds, it has one of the largest song vocabularies, with each male capable of singing up to 3,000 different song types!
The melodies include mimicking sounds of other birds, amphibians, mammals, and even mechanical noises.
Both male and female brown thrashers may vocalize repetitively with sharp whistling sounds during the nighttime in the spring and summer breeding season. Scientists theorize that this unique nighttime whistling may help maintain pair bonds between mated pairs.
The whistles can vary in pitch, length, and repetition rate – almost sounding like they are coded messages between pairs!
While the exact purpose remains uncertain, research suggests that the human-like whistling abilities of the brown thrasher likely play an important role in communication and pair bonding rituals critical to reproductive success.
It’s simply one small part of what makes this songbird such an incredible avian impressionist!
The Lyrebird: A Backyard Impressionist
Habitat and Range: Native to Australia
The lyrebird is a ground-dwelling songbird found in the forests of eastern Australia. There are two species – the superb lyrebird and the Albert’s lyrebird. Superb lyrebirds are more widespread, found in forested areas of Victoria, New South Wales, and southeastern Queensland.
Albert’s lyrebirds have a more limited range in southern Queensland and northeastern New South Wales.
Lyrebirds prefer moist eucalyptus forests and rainforests. They need dense undergrowth where they can hide from predators. The superb lyrebird is adaptable and can thrive in bushland around major cities like Sydney and Melbourne, as long as there is adequate forest cover.
The Albert’s lyrebird has a more specific habitat preference for subtropical and cool temperate rainforests.
Lyrebirds are endemic to Australia and can’t be found anywhere else in the world. Their unique vocal talents have evolved over millions of years of isolation on the Australian continent. Lyrebirds are shy, terrestrial birds that rarely fly.
They spend most of their time scratching through leaf litter on the forest floor in search of food.
High Quality Mimicry Skills: Tricking Other Birds
Lyrebirds are masters of mimicry and can reproduce almost any sound from their environment. They incorporate the songs of other birds, mammalian calls, mechanical sounds like camera shutters, and even chainsaws into their vocal repertoire.
Some lyrebirds have been recorded mimicking up to 20 different species in their song!
During breeding season, male lyrebirds perform elaborate song and dance displays to impress females. Their mimetic skill allows them to trick other birds by including snippets of their songs. Duped birds fly into the lyrebird’s territory ready to fight, only to find themselves facing off against the master mimic!
Albert’s lyrebirds are considered the best mimics, able to convincingly reproduce the calls of over 70 species of birds. Superb lyrebirds have a slightly less versatile repertoire but make up for it with their ability to mimic sounds like car alarms, camera clicks, and crying babies.
Researchers believe lyrebirds evolved mimicry as a defense mechanism. By reproducing dangerous or predatorial sounds, they can scare off potential threats. Mimicry may also help attract mates by demonstrating fitness and vocal complexity.
Whatever the reasons, the lyrebird’s mimicking mastery is unmatched in the animal kingdom.
Conclusion
The Northern Mockingbird, Brown Thrasher, and Lyrebird are all exceptionally gifted vocal mimics that have mastered the art of copying sounds, including human whistling and speech. Their mimicry serves purposes like defending territories and attracting mates in creative ways.
So next time you hear an eerie, human-like whistle at night, you can likely credit one of these remarkable bird impersonators.
