Ok so in my story my main character whistles to communicate with a creature she has befriended but I'm not sure how to describe the different whistles. I feel like saying "I whistled, a low then high pitch" and stuff similar to that over and over again would end up getting annoying and sounding weird. Can anyone help me out?
There's a great description of whistling used as communication in the Wiki article on whistling https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whistling - including the whistled Indigenous language still used in the Canary Islands called Silbo Gomero https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silbo_Gomero You can watch a documentary (26:29 min) about this whistling language - called Written in the Wind - at the following link: https://www.francescaphillips.com/written-in-the-wind/
Is it whistling of little tunes, or just sounds? Either way, I would think after a loose description of the first attempt or two, you simply wouldn't describe it anymore, you'd just say they communicated, and maybe ocasionally a reminder that they're whistling at each other. You might say "I whistled about sorrow and grief, and he replied with his own ideas on the topic," or something. But it might be difficult to explain how ideas can be communicated by whistling. Is there a complex language that must be learned, of various combinations of whistles?
Well it's not too complicated, between my mc and the creature, it's very simple, similar to if you like said a single word like "Sit" or "Place" to a dog but in form of a whistle if that makes sense Also I think I might use what you said earlier on about just describing what the whistles mean etc
Ok, got it. So not really a language, but just some simple prompts or commands, like when a deer flicks it tail to warn the rest of the herd of a possible predator.
