While camping under the open sky one morning, the twinkling stars in the grey velvet night giving way to the first red rays of dawn over the hilltop, the soft tweets of a birdsong carried across the wind. Deep in the forest birds conducted their elaborate dance without a care for human ears. I sat and listened as I put a kettle on the stove. How musical!
Back in civilisation and wifi range I did a little sleuthing* on these birds, having considered the purpose of the birdsong. It would appear the birdsong has developed as a mating strategy amongst certain birds. And it’s clever.
“You look very….. French”
The normal male birds range widely to forage for twigs and leaves that will make an impressive nest. Throughout winter these males work, gradually slotting each element into the construction until a grand nest is complete. I imagine even in such a little bird-brain the male feels tremendous satisfaction upon the culmination of his labours. He has created something out of nothing! Now, his little bird breast puffed out he seeks a female to install into his nest.
The females didn’t do much in winter. Their role is not nest-building. They simply wait for the males to finish and then perform a tour of the nests, much like the Queen inspecting her guards. The male bird who has foraged best and created the most impressive nest earns the honour of the female taking up residence. The mating ritual is almost complete.
from MTV Nests
Within this species is another mating strategy. The song birds don’t build nests. They don’t forage a metre further than they need for their own sustenance. Rather, the songbird spends his time perfecting his beautifully melodic singing voice. And with good reason.
While the nest-building males are showing off their real estate, the songbird males are showcasing their vocal talents. And the females have a weakness for singing. It would appear that there is an exploit within the female bird’s brain that would make Internet Explorer 8 blush. That female brain is not properly secured with it’s AntiSong software. So the songbird sings and the female at first pays slight attention. That attention soon becomes rapt, she’s intrigued. Before long she’s enraptured by the melodic tweets. The songbird ups the ante until he’s rogering the female, passing his DNA to the next generation to be raised in another male’s nest.
Nature has it’s own K and R selection strategies.
This is the point about Game. It’s fine to earn money, travel, build social circles, dress in suits or whatever else the âget your shit togetherâ blogs recommend. That’s an impressive nest for a female to take a guided tour of. But while you’re dicking around with that, other men are working on their Song.
You can’t keep your female in the nest 24/7. She keeps hearing the beautiful melody carried across the wind, wondering who is singing. She’ll venture out. And then, much faster than it takes to build a nest, she’ll be seduced and enraptured**
Flown the nest
Game is a trojan horse that detects and exploits weaknesses in a woman’s No Filter. All day every day a hot young girl is under attack from male mating strategies, be it the omnipresent orbiter, the promotion-with-strings manager, the helpful neighbour, or the back alley rapist. Evolution has equipped her with a strong anti-virus software â the No Filter â to rebuff these attacks so she can retain control of the mating ritual and make it work for her to get what she wants. Evolution never prepared her for Game â the deliberate and practiced study of charisma, custom-designed to defeat that No Filter. It’s like a weaponised virus attacking a common immune system.
You can only build one nest, and few females are willing to share it with rivals. The birdsong is song across the entire forest and all surrounding fields, luring the females out of their nests just long enough to notch them. If only somebody had written a book on Birdsong Mastery you could dispense with all the nest-building bullshit.
* Long enough to find this link, and that’s it. Didn’t bother reading past the fourth paragraph. I have no idea if the biology is correct.
** Probably fucked in the disabled toilets of Charing Cross Hotel at 4pm.
*** Credit to Bodi for putting the birdsong name onto the concept.
