![\"Common](\"http:\/\/earbirding.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/10\/coni_oldenettel.jpg\" "\\"coni_oldenettel\\"")
<\/a>Sutherland wrote up his findings in a 1963 article in Living Bird that remains perhaps the best source published to date on Common Nighthawk vocalizations.\u00a0 Unfortunately, he excluded the Antillean birds from his discussion.\u00a0 On the other hand, he did donate his recordings to Cornell, and now they can be heard online at the Macaulay Library’s website<\/a>.<\/p>\n Sutherland’s recordings are noteworthy on many levels.\u00a0 For one thing, since he was in the area of sympatry, they often capture the calls of both nighthawk species at once.\u00a0 For another, Sutherland managed to record many rarely-heard vocalizations, such as begging calls of nestling Common Nighthawks<\/a>, distraction displays by a female Antillean<\/a>, and the “pik pik pik” notes<\/a> given by Commons in aerial chases.<\/p>\n In the vocal notes on his recordings, Sutherland often referred to the Antillean Nighthawks as the “pi-ti-mi-dick” birds, after the distinctive rhythm of their calls.\u00a0 There is one individual, however, that he refers to as “the improper pit-i-mi-dick<\/em> bird,” apparently because the thought its call didn’t sound quite right for an Antillean Nighthawk.\u00a0 You can hear this bird on Macaulay Library cut 5904<\/a>.\u00a0 It used to be classified as a Common Nighthawk, but as of this writing Macaulay’s got it labeled as an Antillean, and it’s certainly a confusing bird.\u00a0 Here are a couple of spectrograms:<\/p>\n To listen to the bird, click here<\/a>.<\/p>\n Note that the bird gives a mix of short “pik” notes (the vertical lines on the spectrogram) and Common Nighthawk-like “peent” notes (the thicker blotches).\u00a0 By themselves, both of these elements suggest Common Nighthawk, as that species gives both calls.\u00a0 However, what seems odd is that the “piks” and the “peents” usually seem to merge into one, “pik pik pikpeent,” so that the typical rhythm ends up echoing that of the stereotypical chicken vocalization: “buk buk bukKAW.”\u00a0 By going through every recording labeled “Common Nighthawk,” I located nine cuts that included the “pik” call [1<\/a> 2<\/a> 3<\/a> 4<\/a> 5<\/a> 6<\/a> 7<\/a> 8<\/a> 9<\/a>], usually alongside the “peent,” but none of them contain anything like this combination rhythm.<\/p>\n Here’s a typical Antillean Nighthawk call for comparison.\u00a0 It’s giving a relatively stereotyped “pit-i-mi-dick” of 2-6 notes in slightly decelerating series, the first element slightly longer than the others:<\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a>