Science desk
< August 18	<< Jul \| August \| Sep >>	Current desk >

Welcome to the Wikipedia Science Reference Desk Archives
The page you are currently viewing is a transcluded archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current reference desk pages.

August 19

Bird ears

The ossicles are use by mammalian animals to pick up very low noises. Birds seem to have good hearing. They use sound to communicate a lot. How do they listen well without ossicles? -- Toytoy (talk) 09:20, 19 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Here is a pretty easily understandable paper: https://escholarship.org/uc/item/1kp2r437 41.23.55.195 (talk) 09:52, 19 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The Wikipedia article is at Bird anatomy#Nervous system, but is not terribly readable. Alansplodge (talk) 21:53, 19 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]

It does, however, explicitly mention that (various) birds do have ossicles – "Ossicles within green finches, blackbirds, song thrushes, and house sparrows are proportionately shorter to those found in pheasants, Mallard ducks, and sea birds" – so Toytoy's query is based on a false premise.

Middle ear#Other animals, para 2 states:

"In reptiles, birds, and early fossil tetrapods, there is a single auditory ossicle, the columella (that is homologous with the stapes, or "stirrup" of mammals). This is connected indirectly with the eardrum via a mostly cartilaginous extracolumella and medially to the inner-ear spaces via a widened footplate in the fenestra ovalis.[5] The columella is an evolutionary derivative of the bone known as the hyomandibula in fish ancestors, a bone that supported the skull and braincase."

{The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 90.209.121.96 (talk) 16:32, 20 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]