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Songbirds Have In-Flight ‘Conversations’ With Other Species During Migration, Study Shows

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20 Jan, 2025

This post was originally published on Eco Watch

If you were a bird flying thousands of miles over land or sea with other migrating birds, what would you talk about to pass the time?

Songbirds may converse with other species during their long migrations, forming social bonds and possibly exchanging information about the flight, according to a new study led by researchers at University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (UIUC).

“The night sky teems with migrating songbirds, aloft in their millions following routes etched in evolutionary time. But those flight paths may not be entirely innate,” a press release from UIUC said.

The researchers analyzed data from more than 18,300 hours of calls recorded in-flight, which suggested songbirds might “talk” with migration mates.

“We can’t be sure what they’re saying, but birds might broadcast calls during flight to signal their species, age, and sex. And we can certainly speculate that these flight calls could relate to navigation or finding suitable stopover habitat,” said lead author of the study Benjamin Van Doren, an assistant professor in UIUC’s Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Sciences, in the press release.

Research from 2024 by co-authors of the new study at the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science, Appalachian Laboratory found evidence to suggest that songbirds “buddy up” with other migrating species at stopover sites, but until now there wasn’t any evidence that different species “pair up or communicate vocally on the wing.”

Van Doren believes memory and innate patterning are important drivers of behaviors during migration, but said “it’s time to rethink songbird migration through a social lens.”

“In recent years, there has been an increasing recognition of the importance of social information in bird migration, but scientists have mainly documented this in species that travel during the day or in family groups,” Van Doren noted. “The social environment also seems to be important in species like hawks and storks that form huge aggregations during their daytime migrations. Young birds learn behaviors from observing other birds and how they navigate — and not necessarily from family.”

Most songbirds make their journeys at night, when visual cues aren’t necessarily discernable. This led Van Doren to think about the possibility of other social cues, so he used his access to acoustic recordings from 26 sites of autumn nocturnal bird migrations in eastern North America taken over a three–year period.

“These nocturnal acoustic recordings are really the only window onto this unseen but absolutely massive flow of birds — hundreds of millions aloft over the U.S. on any given night during migration,” Van Doren said. “It’s something people aren’t usually aware of because it happens when we’re sleeping.”

Songbirds migrating at night. TOLGA DOGAN / iStock / Getty Images Plus

The thousands of hours of recordings were processed by a machine learning tool that allowed the research team to detect 27 species’ signature flight calls, including 25 well-sampled songbirds.

The team first identified species, then measured the frequency with which certain calls co-occurred, testing at intervals of 15 seconds, half a minute and one minute. They found associations that were stronger than would be expected by chance, regardless of the time elapsed.

Searching for an explanation of the associations, the researchers found that the similarity of calls and wing lengths of species were most important. By contrast, birds who “buddy up” during migration stopovers were not maintaining the same relationships while flying, nor were they necessarily in the air with closely related birds or species who shared their specific habitat preferences.

“Species with similar wing sizes were more likely to associate, and wing length is directly linked to flight speed. If you imagine two species flying at similar speeds because they have similar wings, then it’s much easier for them to stick together,” Van Doren explained. “As for vocalizations, it is possible that species’ calls have converged over time because of this social link or that species that happen to give similar calls are simply more likely to gravitate towards each other.”

Van Doren noted that 25 individuals was a small representative subset of songbird species who migrate at night, some of whom don’t vocalize during flight. Van Doren and his team have plans to conduct more research, including tracking individual birds’ “conversations” with flight partners by attaching tiny microphones to be worn throughout their migrations.

The preliminary results bring up many speculative theories, such as that short-lived songbird species who aren’t able to rely on their parents for guidance might rely on social ties during the journey. In addition, the rapid loss of bird biodiversity due to habitat destruction and climate change may jeopardize co-migrating partner species.

“This study really calls into question the long-held idea that songbirds migrate alone, solely following their own instincts,” Van Doren said. “Learning more about the consequences of these social connections — not only for migration, but also for other aspects of their biology — will be important to inform and manage the risks they face in a changing world.”

The post Songbirds Have In-Flight ‘Conversations’ With Other Species During Migration, Study Shows appeared first on EcoWatch.

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Taking the electronic pulse of the circular economy

Taking the electronic pulse of the circular economy

In June, I had the privilege of attending the 2025 E-Waste World, Battery Recycling, Metal Recycling, and ITAD & Circular Electronics Conference & Expo events in Frankfurt, Germany.

Speaking in the ITAD & Circular Electronics track on a panel with global Circular Economy leaders from Foxway Group, ERI and HP, we explored the evolving role of IT asset disposition (ITAD) and opportunities in the circular electronics economy.

The event’s focus on advancing circular economy goals and reducing environmental impact delivered a series of insights and learnings. From this assembly of international expertise across 75+ countries, here are some points from the presentations that stood out for me:

1. Environmental impact of the digital economy

Digitalisation has a heavy material footprint in the production phase, and lifecycle thinking needs to guide every product decision. Consider that 81% of the energy a laptop uses in its lifetime is consumed during manufacture (1 tonne in manufacture is equal to 10,000 tonnes of CO2) and laptops are typically refreshed or replaced by companies every 3–4 years.

From 2018 to 2023, the average number of devices and connections per capita in the world increased by 50% (2.4 to 3.6). In North America (8.2 to 13.4) and Western Europe (5.6 to 9.4), this almost doubled. In 1960, only 10 periodic table elements were used to make phones. In 1990, 27 elements were used and now over 60 elements are used to build the smartphones that we have become so reliant on.

A key challenge is that low-carbon and digital technologies largely compete for the same minerals. Material resource extraction could increase 60% between 2020 and 2060, while demand for lithium, cobalt and graphite is expected to rise by 500% until 2050.

High growth in ICT demand and Internet requires more attention to the environmental footprint of the digital economy. Energy consumption of data centres is expected to more than double by 2026. The electronics industry accounts for over 4% of global GHG — and digitalisation-related waste is growing, with skewed impacts on developing countries.

E-waste is rising five times faster than recycling — 1 tonne of e-waste has a carbon footprint of 2 tonnes. Today’s solution? ‘Bury it or burn it.’ In terms of spent emissions, waste and the costs associated with end-of-life liabilities, PCBAs (printed circuit board assembly) cost us enormously — they generally achieve 3–5% recyclability (75% of CO2 in PCBAs is from components).

2. Regulating circularity in electronics

There is good momentum across jurisdictions in right-to-repair, design and labelling regulations; recycling targets; and voluntary frameworks on circularity and eco-design.

The EU is at the forefront. EU legislation is lifting the ICT aftermarket, providing new opportunities for IT asset disposition (ITAD) businesses. To get a sense, the global market for electronics recycling is estimated to grow from $37 billion to $108 billion (2022–2030). The value of refurbished electronics is estimated to increase from $85.9 billion to $262.2 billion (2022–2032). Strikingly, 40% of companies do not have a formal ITAD strategy in place.

Significantly, the EU is rethinking its Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) management targets, aligned with upcoming circularity and WEEE legislation, as part of efforts to foster the circular economy. A more robust and realistic circularity-driven approach to setting collection targets would better reflect various factors including long lifespans of electronic products and market fluctuations.

Australia and New Zealand lag the EU’s comprehensive e-waste mandated frameworks. The lack of a systematic approach results in environmental degradation and missed positioning opportunities for businesses in the circular economy. While Australia’s Senate inquiry into waste reduction and recycling recommended legislating a full circular economy framework — including for imported and local product design, financial incentives and regulatory enforcement, New Zealand remains the only OECD country without a national scheme to manage e-waste.

3. Extending product lifecycles

Along with data security and digital tools, reuse was a key theme in the ITAD & Circular Electronics track of the conference. The sustainable tech company that I lead, Greenbox, recognises that reuse is the simplest circular strategy. Devices that are still functional undergo refurbishment and are reintroduced into the market, reducing new production need and conserving valuable resources.

Conference presenters highlighted how repair over replacement is being legislated as a right in jurisdictions around the world. Resources are saved, costs are lowered, product life is extended, and people and organisations are empowered to support a greener future. It was pointed out that just 43% of countries have recycling policies, 17% of global waste is formally recycled, and less than 1% of global e-waste is formally repaired and reused.

Right to repair is a rising wave in the circular economy, and legislation is one way that civil society is pushing back on programmed obsolescence. Its global momentum continues at different speeds for different product categories — from the recent EU mandates to multiple US state bills (and some laws) through to repair and reuse steps in India, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.

The European Commission’s Joint Research Commission has done a scoping study to identify product groups under the Ecodesign framework that would be most relevant for implementing an EU-wide product reparability scoring system.

Attending this event with the entire electronic waste recycling supply chain — from peers and partners to suppliers and customers — underscored the importance of sharing best practices to address the environmental challenges that increased hardware proliferation and complex related issues are having on the world.

Ross Thompson is Group CEO of sustainability, data management and technology asset lifecycle management market leader Greenbox. With facilities in Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne, Canberra, Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch, Greenbox Group provides customers all over the world a carbon-neutral supply chain for IT equipment to reduce their carbon footprint by actively managing their environmental, social and governance obligations.

Image credit: iStock.com/Mustafa Ovec

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