Hoylake Bird Observatory (1 Viewer)

[rollingthunder]

Hoylake Bird Obs? New one on me.....until the penny dropped

Laurie:t:

 

[davewalters]

Nice, I think I'm getting it but have become a bit of a technophobe since we last met!
It's essentially three elements.

Parabolic Reflector
Microphone (Any mic will fit in the Parabolic you suggest?)
Recorder

How do you position it? I do have a few trees on my property over 60 feet but I don't fancy that. Is it ok just outside on a tripod?

Looking forward to this. My Garden list stalled in the 90's. Not the decade obv!

Luv Dave

 

[Jane Turner]

Any Omni-directional mic will work in the parabolic - but the mic is where to spend your money. I usually open my office/seawatch hide window and point the parabolic upwards and out a bit over the beach. This has the advantage that the recorder is inside and can be powered.

You need some software too - I recommend Audacity and Raven [from Cornell] I use Audacity to listen and make quick assessments on sonagrams, isolate calls I want to look at further and cut out noise, whilst Raven is better for producing final sonagrams

In other news there was a Yellow-browed Warbler in ther back garden yesterday afternoon

https://www.dropbox.com/s/cm7iym1zzvno91r/Yellow-browed 19th October 2019-10-19 17-58-29.mp4?dl=0


This is a play through on audacity, using windows 10's recorder to capture a video.

 

[Jane Turner]

Jan 1st 2020.
30 species recorded today, unsurprisingly 30 for the year. 42 birds caught, 15 of which were retraps.

The biggest surprise was a nominate race Chiffchaff which was caught in the front garden, in the buckthorn. Chaffinch and Goldcrest were also likely migrants.

A sound only Raven 4 Brent Geese, viewable down the mist-net lane and 200 or so Pink-footed Geese were the other highlights

 

[Jane Turner]

Jan 2nd

The weather deteriorated at lunchtime, but by then I had color-ringed two more Blackcaps 31st species for 2020

 

[Jane Turner]

Up to 10 warblers now ringed this year, with another Chiffchaff. A surprise Redwing, trapped coming into roost was a 1st for the year.

 

[Jane Turner]

After days of gales and lashing rain, it was a little calmer and brighter today.

2 adult Little Gulls, around 150 Kittiwakes and a Razorbill was new for the year [53 species]

There was a Great Northern Diver on Jan 25th as well as regular sighings of Chiffchaffs

 

[Jane Turner]

Up to 61 species now this year with the surprise capture of a Tree Sparrow Yesterday. Never common on North Wirral, these species is declining markedly, so I was less that 50:50 about recording one this year, let alone ringing one.

Also new were Wigeon, Jackdaw and Rock Pipit.


A Fulmar Feb 23rd was unexpected.

In January I rang 85 birds of 15 species, but only 10 of 6 species in February.

 

[Jane Turner]

Another new ringing species for the house - though it didn't start too promisingly, since I had not reset the whoosh net

https://twitter.com/Turnershbo/status/1247051708045438976


However two hours later he caught himself in a net set to catch Blackcaps.


https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EU528LzWsAA-Hzk?format=jpg&name=medium




Today the 1st Tree Pipit of the year flew over