What happened to the birds in 'The Twelve Days of Christmas'?

We all know it. We've all sung it. Perhaps we've even answered a quiz question about it*. The Twelve Days of Christmas has become as quintessentially festive as a figgy pudding, or the bad joke in your Christmas cracker. But why exactly is your 'true love' gifting all these birds? And importantly, how are they faring nowadays? Prof Andy Gosler (from the Edward Grey Institute in the Department of Biology, and Institute of Human Sciences in the School of Anthropology) is the only professor of 'ethno-ornithology' in the world, specialising in the study of the relationships between birds and people. So, who better to be our guest on this festive edition of the Big Questions Podcast, where we take a deep dive into one of our favourite Christmas carols? (*There are 364 presents in total, by the way!)

You can listen to What happened to the birds in 'The Twelve Days of Christmas'? online on Radio and Podcast. Open the player on this page to stream the available audio.

What happened to the birds in 'The Twelve Days of Christmas'? is an episode from Oxford Sparks Big Questions by Fiona Jones.

This episode is 14:15 long.

This episode was published on Dec 10, 2025.

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