Club-Winged Manakin
Most animals communicate by singing, howling, croaking, or speaking. Some animals use other sounds too- whistling, clapping, drumming, or rattling, for example. The rattlesnake sends a threatening message by rattling its tail, a Ruffed Grouse produces a dull thudding sound with its wings to court a mate, and a woodpecker drums out its territorial signal on a hollow tree.
Birds often use their wings and other body parts to make sounds, but Manakins are the planet’s preeminent wing-popping, clicking, snapping, and rattling birds. Found in the tropical forests from Mexico to Argentina., 20 species of manakin make nonvocal sounds, or sonations. Male manakins take the prize for the most diverse and interesting nonvocal sounds produced in the bird world.
One species of manakin’s sonations are truly unique. The Club-winged Manakin (Machaeropterus deliciosus) uses its feathers as a violin, making an extraordinary sound. Male Club-winged Manakins make a ringing tick, tick, ting sound when trying to attract females to mate. The ting in particular is a high-pitched note, sounding somewhat like a violin. To make the sound, the bird tips forward and flips its wings above its back and knocks a pair of modified wing feathers together at a very high speed-twice as fast as an average hummingbird flaps its wings.
An investigation of the bird’s feathers reveal tiny ridges on the club-shaped, hollow wing feathers for which the Club-winged Manakin is named. An adjacent feather has a kink in it that makes its feather shaft lie on top of the ridges, making the feathers function like a violin and bow.
Although a few insects have made violins of their bodies to communicate, there are no other violins among vertebrate animals besides the stringed instruments invented by humans. Thus, male Club-winged Manakins use a unique mechanism communicate their attractiveness to potential mates.
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