Misconception #4: Ducks Quack Doesn't Echo

Hey Steemians!

As we continue our series of debunking misconceptions, today's misconception is about a certain mystery that had wondered the TVs and internet for quite some time.

Ducks quack doesn't echo, and no one knows why!

Are ducks out of this world? Do they have a sacred deal with the sound waves not to repeat their words? I doubt that, and we are to explain that this is actually another misconceptions.

So, going back to the roots:

Why this misconception came to exist in the first place?

There are several potential explanations to the cause behind this:

For one, ducks aren't typically found near sound-reflecting surfaces
Two, ducks quack too quietly to generate an easily audible echo outdoors, as we will see in some of the explanations below.

Busting the Myth

There has actually been quite a few studies to bust this myth, and the result was as expected, a quack DOES in fact ECHO.
One such experiment was one conducted in 2003, by Trevor Cox, of the acoustics research center at the University of Salford - Manchester, with a test duck called Daisy:

Acoustic expert Trevor Cox tested the popular myth — often the subject of television quiz shows and Internet chat rooms — by first recording Daisy’s quack in a special chamber with jagged surfaces that produces no sound reflections.
She was then moved to a reverberation chamber with cathedral-like acoustics before the data was used to create simulations of Daisy performing at the Royal Albert Hall and quacking as she flew past a cliff face.
The tests revealed that a duck’s quack definitely echoes, just like any other sound, but perhaps not as noticeably.
“A duck quacks rather quietly, so the sound coming back is at a low level and might not be heard,” Cox [said].
“Also, a quack is a fading sound. It has a gradual decay, so it’s hard to tell the difference between the actual quack and the echo. That’s especially true if you haven’t previously heard what it sounds like with no reflections.”
He said ducks were normally found in open-water areas and didn’t usually congregate around echoey cliffs, which may have fueled the theory that their quacks don’t produce an echo.
“You get a bit of reverberation — it’s distinctly echoey,” Cox said

And as a proof to your ears, here is a duck echo sound as recorded in the prior experiment as depicted in the reverberation chamber
http://www.acoustics.salford.ac.uk/acoustics_info/duck/media/trans.mp3

Another experiment was conducted by none other than our fellow "Myth Busters" from the famous TV show. Their findings were clear:

When examined by an audio-expert, it was found that the echo was “swallowed” by the original quack, due to the very similar acoustic structure between the quack and the echo. Because of this, it may be difficult to tell where the quack ends and the echo begins.

Judgment
So as you can clearly see based on the experiments, the duck's quack most certainly echoes, yet it might be difficult to hear or identify!

If you liked this post, you might want to check out my earlier posts from the Misconceptions series:

Misconception #1: @mcfarhat/humans-have-way-more-than-5-senses
Misconception #2: @mcfarhat/misconception-2-water-is-a-good-conductor-of-electricity
Misconception #3: @mcfarhat/misconception-3-ostriches-bury-their-head-in-sand-when-scared

Thank you for stopping by!

References:

Photo Credit:

Image 1: Myth Busters