Dinosaur sounds?

[Infinity Blade]

What are your opinions on what sounds are most likely for dinosaurs? It seems that some vocalizations (e.g. roaring) are being considered less likely than others.

[creature386]

www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/08912960903033327
Phil Senter seems to be skeptical of dinosaurs using any vocalizations at all for acoustic communication, though he suggests that they may have been capable of other forms of acoustic communication (i.e. diplodocids using their whip-like tails or some hadrosaurs using their nasals).

[Infinity Blade]

How are hisses "non-vocal" according to that paper?

If true though, then I would guess the past must have been comparatively bland in terms of sound.

[creature386]

Maybe "non-vocal" simply refers to whatever doesn't need a more-or-less sophisticated vocal apparatus.

[theropod]

I think he means made by the vocal chords i.e. the larynx
Hissing is probablywould appear to be generated in the oral cavity, similar to whistling.

[Infinity Blade]

I just learned something interesting. Extant cathartids (New World vultures) lack a functioning syrinx and are limited to making grunts and hisses. Here's-> a page with recordings from turkey vultures. Maybe some dinosaurs could have sounded similar?

Edit: after reading brolyeuphyfusion's comment below, I now suspect that grunts and hisses are made by NW vultures not because they're constrained by a lack of a syrinx, but because that's simply what they evolved to sound like.

Edit 1/14/20: I found this.

Despite the importance of the syrinx, the larynx is not irrelevant and moves anteriorly and posteriorly, as well as dorsally and ventrally, during vocalization. This changes the size and shape of the mouth and throat cavity and seems to play a key role in how birds control the noises they produce.

The Complete Dinosaur->

So given that birds clearly possess a larynx (in addition to a syrinx) that still plays a significant role in vocalizations, and that modern crocodilians possess a larynx, I see no reason to assume non-avian dinosaurs somehow wouldn't have had one.

[Deleted]

Well, we know Parasaurolophus was able to make sounds using it's crest. Same would have applied to dinosaurs with similar structures, although the sounds would have been different due to differing crest shapes.

Senter's paper argues that the lack of a syrinx means that nonavian dinosaurs couldn't vocalize. He apparently didn't consider the role of the larynx in vocalization. Although they had no syrinx, nonavian dinosaurs still had the larynx to vocalize with like modern birds do. So, contrary to what he believes, nonavian dinosaurs were very likely able to vocalize. See Darren Naish's comment from here: albertonykus.blogspot.com/2011/02/singing-raptors.html

I think there's been a mistake here, and that the claims of 'no laryngeal involvement in avian vocalisation' are based on old literature. Not only do birds possess a larynx, recent work has shown that (in some species, like chickens) it is highly mobile, and that it does indeed play a role in vocalising. I'll have a chat with Phil Senter about this some time (he's the one responsible for the argument you report above).

See...

Homberger, D. G. 1986. The lingual apparatus of the African grey parrot Psittacus erithacusLinné (Aves: Psittacidae): description and theoretical mechanical analysis. Ornithological Monographs 39, 1-233.

- . 1999. The avian tongue and larynx: multiple functions in nutrition and vocalization. In Adams, N. & Slotow, R. (eds) Proceedings of the 22nd International Ornithological Congress,University of Natal, Durban, South Africa. BirdLife (Johannesburg), pp. 94-113.

Ankylosaurs were probably able to use their nasal passages as resonation chambers for vocalization.

As for sauropods, aside from the simple laryngeal vocalizations they likely have had, brachiosaurids had oversized nares (far surpassing the extent of the nasal fenestrae). It's likely that such large nares held resonation chambers in life (what else would you evolve such huge nares for?), playing a substantial role in vocalization.

Nonavian dinosaurs, like modern birds, may have also been able to vocalize without opening their mouths according to a recent paper.

Nonvocal dinosaurs? Very unlikely based on current knowledge. Far from being nearly silent and acoustically bland, the Mesozoic era would have been filled with the voices of the dinosaurs.

[Grey]

I always have an issue with the claim that no dinosaurs could roar or emit roar-like sounds at all, under the claim that it is too mammalian, I have a hard time to believe that such long-lived, successful and complex and diversified clade would have been incapable to evolve vocalization on a level comparable or even superior to that known in mammals and modern birds.

I like the proposition from the Saurian team to depict Tyrannosaurus with heavy croc-like sounds but I would be reluctant to say that a roaring big theropod is necessarily pure fiction.

[theropod]

^By that logic, why do only mammals (specifically carnivorans) roar, even though all other animals combined are a lot more long-lived, successful, complex and diversified? There are more than twice as many bird species, many of them highly vocal, yet none of them roar. That has nothing to do with what "level" of vocalization the animals are capable of, there is just no reason why they would sound the same. What sort of evolutionary pressures for different animals to converge on similar sounds would there be? Does roaring impart some sort of universal advantage over other sounds? If not, then it is indeed pure fiction to presume dinosaurs sounded like lions.

[spartan]

Is "roar" even defined? The most iconic 'roar' from JP's T. rex' for example sounds nothing like a big cat's roar, but is still referred to as 'roar'.

[Grey]

I wouldn't compare the diversity of shapes, sizes, ecosystems and lifespan of reptiles and birds with that of dinosaurs. Would you extrapolate the sounds of Argentinosaurus from an ostrich or a nile crocodile? What kind of sounds would make a T. rex-sized eagle? I agree with the questions you post but basically I don't think it is a ridiculous to not think no roar-like sound ever occured during the whole Mesozoic. And I don't necessarily talk about a lion-like roar but a variety of sounds we couldn't even conceptualize with our ears used to mammalian roars and grunts. Not saying this occured, just staying open to the possibility.

[Infinity Blade]

Considering what brolyeuphyfusion said above (that dinosaurs had larynxes to vocalize with), wouldn't it be safe to say that it's not out of the question for dinosaurs to have made something that can be considered a "roar"? That crocodiles or ratites emit low-pitched growls or hisses doesn't necessarily mean that say, a predatory dinosaur didn't make a noise that was more high pitched (for lack of a better way to put it) and yet still loud, rather deep (again, lack of better ways to put it), basically "roar-like", right? It could do so for the same reasons modern large predators roar.

I'm not saying they did so: after all, Saurian's crocodilian-like gurgles could probably just as easily fill the part. I'm just saying that maybe it's not unlikely per se but merely speculative.

[Grey]

That's my opinion Ausar, I don't argue roar-like sounds occured for sure but I couldn't claim that because modern eagles and crocs don't emit sounds of this kind, this makes it totally implausible for a 8 tonnes, agressive, complex and possibly territorial giant theropod to have done so.

[theropod]

The question is, does being an "8 tonnes, agressive, complex and possibly territorial giant theropod" make roaring any more likely than being any other animal?

I know it’s not impossible. It’s just not more likely than any other sound, and there’s no reason why just by pure coincidence large mesozoic theropods would have decided to make the same sound as a genus of cat an era later.
That an extant large predator makes it, doesn’t mean extinct large predators were likely to make it too, unless that sound provides it with some sort of selective advantage in the niche of large predator. But roaring is used for intraspecific communication and showing aggression, is it not? Literally any sound can do that, provided it is loud enough. Mesozoic animals wouldn’t have thought to themselves "Nah, a group of primates a hundred million years in the future would find it totally hilarious if that theropod chirped at me like that, so it’s not going to impress me either".

The ability to roar in the strict sense of the word is an autapomorphy of pantherines, if it were somehow inherently linked to being a large predator, other large predators would do it. Roaring in the wider sense may be restricted to carnivorans, which I don’t have to remind you is probably because of their close relationship and similar anatomy, not because of their ecological niche. Either way, no other group makes that sort of sound in the extant world, and that includes large predators. Of course it’s not impossible that by chance some dinosaurs sounded similar, but compared to the entire array of possibilities it’s not probable either, and neither is there a reason why it should be giant theropods out of all the dinosaurs that could have produced sounds.

I’d prefer to not "extrapolate" or envision any particular sound where we have literally no evidence to go by, that includes the case of Argentinosaurus. Not sure what that has to do with the diversity of extant reptiles, is there some reason to base the sounds Argentinosaurus on a mammal rather than a reptile, if you must absolutely envision it?

[Deleted]

To "roar" is to make a long, loud, deep sound.

There is no reason at all to assume that dinosaurs couldn't make long, loud, and deep sounds.

theropod : Exactly how is long, loud, and deep sounds an autapomorphy of anything?