Protecting and improving green spaces in Lancaster
How to Identify Birds by their Song
by Andrew McCafferty
Following the Dawn Chorus walk I recently led through Fairfield Nature Reserve showing people how to begin identifying birds by their song, I have put together a few selected resources that I hope will encourage anyone who wants to learn more about this. I have also included some quizzes so you can test yourself, if you like.
Websites
xeno-canto
Firstly, a website where you can get song examples for just about any bird you can think of in the world: xeno-canto.
The eBird website is quite a good place to find curated recordings, and they usually pick more examples than the RPSB.
For example, here’s their page on Lesser Whitethroat, which those who attended the Dawn Chorus walk with me through Fairfield Nature Reserve heard.
Apps
The Merlin App
The Merlin app (free from Cornell on iPhone and Android) is useful both for automatically identifying birdsong, but also as a reference guide while you’re out and about. That’s what I use to play birdsong examples when guiding walks.
Merlin is far from infallible when it comes to identifying birdsong. It works by looking at what it can hear right now, and if that particular segment sounds like something else, it can give you an incorrect ID.
If you make sure to tap “stop” rather than “cancel” when you’ve finished recording, you’ll be able to share the recording you got with an expert to check it if you’re not sure.
Alternatively, you can listen to the example clips in Merlin and see if you agree!
Videos
Lucy Lapwing, who people might remember from Springwatch, did this excellent short series of videos on identifying British birdsong a while back, that’s here:
Books
There are also quite a few books out there, if you want something physical, including one by the excellently named sound recordist Geoff Sample.
Now some quizzes that you can use to test yourself.
Bird Song Quiz
First, a plug for a website I made myself! It’s perhaps a bit of a challenge for the beginner, but what it does is pull data from Xeno-Canto, and tests if you can tell apart the species you tell it you want to test yourself on.
Then there’s a quiz from Cornell Labs, who produce eBird and the Merlin app. You need to sign up with Cornell Labs to do the quiz, but its free, and just a normal registration thing.
This is little tricky probably because again the recordings and pictures are from normal punters, so are of varying quality, but it’s a good way to test yourself.
About Andrew McCafferty
I’m a birder from Lancaster, with a particular interest in birdsong and birdsong recording. I’ve been watching birds and recording birdsong since I was 10.
I’ve recently broadened my interests a bit to take in butterflies, moths and dragonflies, and I always like my plant-oriented friends to tell me what I’m looking at wild flower-wise (but still very much a beginner there!).
My day job is software developer, but at any opportunity I’ll get out there to find some birds and wildlife!
Fairfield Nature Reserve iNaturalist Project
The Fairfield Association are using now iNaturalist to log local wildlife observations. If anyone has any recordings of birds that they have made on the Fairfield Nature Reserve, it would be fantastic if you could upload them to iNaturalist.
It doesn’t matter if you have used another app to identify the bird, just upload the sound recording, the date and the location and it will appear as part of the Fairfield Nature Reserve project.
