Anthropogenic noise, song, and territorial aggression in southern house wrens

Anthropogenic noise constrains the transmission of birdsong and alters the behavior of receivers. Many birds adjust their acoustic signals to minimize the interference of anthropogenic noise on signal transmission. Birds may also change their acoustic signals to exchange information during aggressive interactions. However, it is unclear how birds deal with a potential trade-off between adjusting their acoustic signals to better transmit in noisy environments versus mediating aggressive interactions. Additionally, we do not know how urbanization and anthropogenic noise alters the territorial behavior of receivers. We investigated the interplay among song, territorial aggression, urbanization, and anthropogenic noise, in males of the southern house wren (Troglodytes aedon musculus), using recordings of spontaneous songs (non-aggressive context) and a playback experiment simulating a male territorial intrusion (aggressive context). We found that urban wrens behaved more aggressively in res...