Female manakins use male mating call when implanted with male hormones

Among the first things that stand out about golden-collared manakins, a bird found in Panama and western Colombia, are the acrobatics of male adults during breeding season. Males also emit a particular call, the ‘chee-poo’, to attract females. In a new paper published in Animal Behaviour, Smithsonian researchers Ioana Chiver and Barney Schlinger explore the role of androgens—male hormones—in the expression of this vocal behavior, by administering testosterone to females and juvenile males.