iPod Mount Process

How does Songbird (or rather, the underlying extension) handle mounting iPods? I of course refer to iPods that can be mounted (Not iPod Touch/iPhone)

As of late, iPods do not seem to mount normally in OS X, meaning they do not show up as a volume. As far as I can tell, the OS doesn't even recognize the iPod as mounted until iTunes (EDIT: Or Xcode) is opened, and even then, terminal processes don't seem to notice the iPod's presence. This doesn't seem to be an issue for songbird's device support as far as I've noticed, however.

What process the iPod Device Support extension uses to find and mount the iPod? Better yet, can this be used to mount the iPod as a volume, even if it's readonly?