This article first appeared on page 19 of Birdwatching Magazine June 2024
A Blackcap, a garden warbler and a Song Thrush walk into a bar… well, actually, they break into a bar, …of birdsong. How do I know this? Actually, I don’t. I am physically and mentally challenged. I could just blame the fact that I have lost all the hearing in one ear and about 60% in the other. Without my hearing aid in I cannot hear things like ‘do you want a cup of coffee’ or ‘what would you like for dinner?’; with my hearing aid in, I can’t hear things like ‘it’s your turn to clean the shower’ and ‘have you put the bins out?’. The truth is, I was always rubbish at song, losing my hearing made virtually no difference to my ID abilities. I’ve always been visually oriented and audially incompetent. I can hold a tune perfectly, unless, like Schrodinger’s cat someone else observes the performance. I am, them by all accounts, akin to Schrodinger’s cat being strangled; as tuneful as a corncrake, but without the rhythm.
I say virtually unchanged, having a hearing aid has made a difference. The modulation of sound waves into registers where I have some hearing left, means that I can hear crests for the first time in years. It makes hearing others easier too, like Long-tailed Tits. Not having ‘binocular’ hearing, I have to pirouette to locate the source of song. When I point my hearing aid in the right direction I can get on to the bird if its showing. Most of the time, I’m looking the wrong way as the trusty aid captures sound from all around and I’ve no clue where the skulkers lurk.
The mental challenge comes when the wind is in the right direction or I happen to be adjacent to the burst of birdsong. Theres maybe twenty birds I can confidently identify by ear alone. You will not be surprised that I find Corncrakes and Cettii’s Warblers pretty unmistakeable. The most familiar I can manage, likje a Robin or a Chaffinch – providing they stick to their script. When the Blackbird sits on the roof opposite my study window and says Prit-ty Bird-ie’ I know who’s calling. Chiffchaffs announce their ID, as do Cuckoos. Despite telling me ‘I-did-nt-do-it’, I know full well that the Wood Pidgeon’s lying.
Here’s the thing. Updating Fatbirder.com’s Wisconsin page I came upon site called ‘Badger Country Birding’, there a birder was explaining how to use ‘Merlin-ID app’ (Free to download). I’d heard of it, but negative tales of inexperienced birders posting stuff on eBird like: ‘Pacific Loon calling from a bush’. Mostly, it seems because the users hadn’t downloaded the European plug-in instead of the US version.
Long story short, I sat on the ramp overlooking the reedbeds and bushes this week with my App out. Merlin heard stuff long before me, and this helped me search in the right place. I already knew I was surrounded by Sedge Warblers and Whitethroats, but it helped me find Reed Warbler and Lesser Whitethroat. Apparently, there was a Cuckoo, but it was beyond even Hawkeye’s range. It was no help with stuff that had pledged Omertà, like the pair of terns that just didn’t quite seem right for common (later identified as Whiskered), or the passing Hobbies and Harriers. Where it really scored for me was letting me know there were Blackcaps aplenty. I saw none, but now know they were neither Song Thrushes, nor garden warblers.
I’ll be using it often, but ONLY to help, never to confirm, it’s a useful tool, not a substitute for fieldcraft.
