Mectapus Odyssey

Reckless Live

A recording from central New York State (North America)of thousands of night migrating birds on the night of September 11-12, 2020. The most common calls are from 12+ species of wood warblers, Rose-breasted Grosbeak & Swainson's Thrush -  most all headed to Caribbean Islands, southern Mexico or Central & South America for the winter. The 6+ hour recording began at 9:45pm EDT. To hear the intricacies, crank the volume. WARNING FOR HEADPHONE LISTENERS: There are a few instances of very loud bird calls (ex. flock of Green Herons passing over at 0:01:45 - one minute 45 seconds into recording. Adjust your headphone listening level on this section before proceeding).

I made this recording using an "Old Bird 21c" microphone mounted on a 2.5 meter wood tower in the middle of a hay field. It contains the densest dark terrain (no artificial light), non-coastal, avian nocturnal flight call rate I have documented in 30+ years of monitoring such calls in North America. The original audio submitted to SoundCloud was a mono wav file, 22050 sampling rate, 16 bit resolution.

The artwork is by Cheryl Chalmers (c) 2011, and depicts her kids listening to night migrating birds through a roof-mounted "flowerpot"  microphone in Trumansburg, NY.

Special thanks to Cathy & Frank Darrow for hosting the recording station in their Danby, NY hayfield, and to Herb Susmann of Nature Sound Electronics for superb S/N in the microphone electronics.

Big Migration Night

Sound and vision, remote and present
Let Happiness Prevail ... among this human infestation
Left claw north, RIGHT CLAW SOUTH

Reckless Live

Mectapus is here with Andrew Farnsworth

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