• The Korean Journal of Zoology
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• v.39 no.3
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• pp.282-291
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• 1996

The song of the bush warbler, Cettia diphone, consists of an introdudory whisde portion and a complex ending syllable portion. In bush warbiers, a song with two or fewer notes in the whistle portion is classified as an a song mode, while a song with three or more notes in the whistle portion as a $\beta$ song mode. Although some variations occur in mode seledion by individuals and populations, the proportion of a mode songs to total songs is 55% (range 51.6-58.7%) on average. The a mode has a higher dominant frequency in the whistle portion than does the $\beta$ mode, but the number of syllables m the complex ending syllable portion is fewer. Bush warbler mode sequences are defined as $\alpha$$\alpha$, $\alpha$$\beta$, $\beta$$\alpha$ and $\beta$$\beta$ mode sequences. In order to test the hypothesis that song modes and mode sequences play a role in the defence of territory in Jeju and Wando populations in the south-coastal geographic song variation group, playback experiments were executed. Mode sequences differed between naturally produced songs and songs produced in response to playback for two populations. In particular, for birds in the Wando populations our results indicate that the use of song modes may be affeded by habitat, singing site and type of territory, and further propose that particular mode sequences may play a more important role than song mode in vocal interadions.