r/askscience

We, humans, use musical scales to make sounds sound like music and not random noise. We have concept of octaves and divide them in certain number of notes and then we choose notes (or tones) that have frequencies with lowest common denominator relative to each other, and they sounds good to our ears. Otherwise it all sounds dissonant and not very musical.

But many birds also sound pleasing and musical. Is it because they use harmonic scales much like our own? Or am I mistaking the psychological calming effect of birds chirping to it being musical?

When solitary wild animals aren’t eating/hunting, evading predators, mating, taking care of offspring, or sleeping, what do they do? Between all of those actions is there a lot of space? How do they fill it?

When it’s cold, reptiles bask in the sun to get the energy needed to go about their day. On days when it’s 104°F /40°C in the shade, do reptiles have too much energy? Are the little lizards around my house meth-ed up?