TEACHING BIRDS TO SING

Press, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22389, 30 April 1938, Page 19

TEACHING BIRDS TO SING

IT has been a current belief for several thousands of years that birds come into the world as

born songsters. We have been making a grave mistake. It is the other way round, the most celebrated expert on canaries tells us. If we want a canary to be a perfect songster, we must teach him to sing, with infinite care and patience—but with marvellous results. At least the results obtained by Mr Paul Fodor, of Budapest, strike the uninitiated as nothing short of miraculous. Mr Fodor is not only famous as a canary breeder all over the world, but he is probably the foremost expert on bird psychology. Mr Fodor does not make breeding a moneymaking business. He owns scores of birds of the rarest breeds, but studies them from a purely scientific point of view and makes breeding experiments to obtain the cross that wiL produce the most perfect songster. Black and white, green and brown, and flame-coloured birds chirrup and hop about cheerfully in the scores of bright cages with which his rooms are filled. The Choir Leader The pride of the collection, the "choir leader," on which the subsequent experiments of Fodor are based, is a small coal-black canary. He is a perfectly accomplished songster—a Jean de Reszke among canaries, a Caruso, a talent born once in 100 years. Paul Fodor studied the little black canary's perfect trills and arpeggios for three years, and at last he got the perfect warbler's melody entirely by heart, so that he was able to write it down—transposing the bird's carolling into "human" notes.

The next step was the synthetic reproduction of this perfection of bird song. "Song-teaching-machines," apparatus to stimulate the singing of birds, have long been in use. Mr Fodor sent to Germany for a machine of this sort, but improved it by building into it his own invention—an arrangement of -silver pipes inside which extremely sensitive membranes serve to give the characteristic "trill" sound of the song of canaries. A sequence of silver pipes like these, tuned in reproduction of the little black Perfect Warbler's song was built into the apparatus, and now serves to teach ambitious feathered:jmpils to

(SFXCIALLT WRITTEN FOR THE PEESB.)

[By MICHAEL LOKANT.]

emulate the glorious example of the winged Caruso.

A Machine as Professor

The singing lesson of a canary class is a most interesting event to watch. The professor—meaning the apparatus—consists of a large metal cylinder. Near this are hung 12 cages: those of the most promising pupils. Then the apparatus is put into action. The sweetest sounds of carolling birds emerge from its metal throat.

At first the birds listen in silence. It looks almost as if they were thrilled into silence by this perfection of song. Then gradually, one after the other gives forth a shy chirrup in imitation of "the professor." After a week it is unmistakable that they are trying to imitate the sounds given forth by the machine. And a few weeks or months later they have attained the perfection of the machine—they have learned the "perfect canary scale" just as a human singer with a fine voice has to be taught to use it to its best advantage. Another "professor" employed in this strange school for canaries is a little wire haired fox-terrier. His pupil is a little green canary. The fox-terrier growls playfully at the bird in its cage, whereupon the little green warbler ruffles his feathers and growls back, in exactly the same tone of voice. Next, the dog barks at the bird, and the canary barks back—for all the world like another fox-terrier, imitating every inflection of the dog's voice. Quite a number of birds have learnt to call the name of the boy who feeds them. When he enters the room, his name—"Tiby"—is called with enthusiasm from hali ft 1 dozen cages. "That is not at all surprising," says Mr Fodor. "Canaries can be taught to speak like parrots—only with a little more patience. A canary owned by a German breeder has been taught to speak several sentences and to give a certain reply to an often repeated question." One canary in the collection is outstanding for his sense of humour. If you play with him, teasing him with a leaf of spinach or some other delicacy, he will give a distinct laugh, loud and clear: "Ha ha ha! He he he!" Others have learnt to imitate the creaking of a door, the screeching of a cockatoo, and a number of dif-j ferent melodies. In addition.4»-#ie

Canaries Need to Learn the Art

infinite patience needed in teaching them, the kind of food they get also is of the greatest importance. Of course Mr Fodor has made a special study of this and has recipes of food' mixtures which he holds to be particularly conducive to the bird's singing abilities. Stimulating mixtures of this nature always precede a singing lesson.

To avoid danger from the radiations of radium it has been customary to keep radium element in heavy lead bombs which confine the radiations. Recently a new alloy, half again as heavy as lead, has been formed of tungsten, nickel, and copper, which is more efficient than lead for this purpose and thus permits smaller bombs to be used safely. The new alloy has a tensile strength higher than that of mild steel, resists corrosion, and takes a high polish. Other uses for it are in balancing crankshafts of racing cars, gyroscopes, and other rapidly rotating parts. - ~.