Brings back memories of my dad's collection of turkey calls and how I would strive to imitate these sounds with wooden contraptions.

Early morning at a turkey roost in a large cottonwood, near the mouth of Aravaipa Canyon, Arizona.  Several of the turkeys have already left the roost, this recording includes the descent of most of the rest, along with other birds singing their dawn songs.  Recorded on May 2, 2021.

Turkey Roost

If you’re a regular listener, you know that I’m interested in the sounds of the natural world and have interviewed quite a few sound recordists on this program. In this episode, you’re going to meet a guy who is more than just a sound hobbyist. He works all over the world for big movie studios—in fact, when we recorded this, he had just returned from a shoot in the Sahara Desert in Algeria for a big Hollywood production He also produces sounds for the video game industry, which is far more complicated than you may think.

My guest is George Vlad. I learned about George’s work a few years ago when I ran across a photograph of him standing on the lip of a volcano with a boom pole extended over the rim. He has recorded soundscapes all over the world: the Amazon Basin, Borneo, the Arabian Desert, the rainforests of west Africa, Madagascar, and all over Europe, including in his native Romania. You can learn more about George and his work, and listen to some great tutorials, at mindful-audio.com, or at his YouTube site. But first, meet George. I caught up with him for this interview at his home in London.

Episode 220 - George Vlad Captures The World

Wind passing through a pine and various sparse shrubs and grasses on a steep slope then subsiding as thunder builds over the area.  There are some various critters and birds rustling around in the background. Recorded with my Sennheiser double mid-side system.

Grasshoppers Wind and Thunder

The Red Deer Rut (Brame du Cerf) recorded in the heart of the  the Orleans Forest, the largest Forest in France. 

Zoom F3 + 2 x Sennheiser MKH8020s
23.09.2023

Red Deer Rut - Forêt d'Orleans, France

Roosevelt Elk (aka Rainforest Elk or Olympic Elk) bulls challenging for social dominance hours after sunset in late September 2023.

Elk live in a fairly well-defined, yet fluid, social hierarchy. Only the biggest or strongest bulls earn the right to mate, so the competition during the female's estrus season is intense. Bulls earn their harem by exerting dominance over other bulls in their territory, either by driving them off or just scaring them off. When a challenger thinks they have what it takes to become the dominant bull they stray into that bull's territory and issue their challenge. If accepted (and it always is), what results is a fierce clash of massive bodies and sharp antlers pushing and shoving until one bull gives in. The battle leaves scars on the ground in the form of huge gashes where antlers and cloven hooves gouged the field and shattered tree branches were flung in the fury.

Recorded in the Quinalt Rainforest River Valley, there's an unavoidable distant wash of river in the background. In addition, there had been a heavy rain event just days before. The river was rushing fairly hard as a result, so the below recording is very lightly processed to reduce the influence of that noise. The unprocessed source immediately follows if you want to hear the difference.

I record elk by leaving recorders out in the field where herds are known to migrate. Occasionally I'm able to follow a herd and record more direct, but I do not want to alarm the herd or stress them unnecessarily, so I try to avoid this method.

Bugles are multi-toned calls that start low and transition into a scream. During the rut season, Bulls use this to express dominance over other males, warding off potential rivals, and attract potential mates. Outside of the rut they will often bugle when leading a herd.

Chuckles, or laughs, sound just like that, a series of short loud grunts. Like bugles, chuckles are used as a form of dominance and attraction call. You'll often hear them used when a bull is specifically calling his harem to gather. They produce chuckles on their own, or sometimes tag them onto the end of a bugle.

image: A magnificent and iconic Big Leaf Maple, taken the following day narthex scene of the battle.

Listen to more bugling and chuckling from this trip in the full playlist here: https://on.soundcloud.com/exa6D

Listen to an early morning soundscape in the nearby Queets Rainforest with a resident herd of Roosevelt Elk wandering through on their daily route here:
https://on.soundcloud.com/sJFsX

Roosevelt Elk Bull challenge with big clashing fight

In nature's dance, a timeless rhyme,
No wars conceived, no famine's grime.
Mother Nature weaves a gentle song,
Where harmony reigns, and peace belongs.

Animals roam in instinct's grace,
No destructive footprints to erase.
They coexist, a balanced chore,
Unlike the chaos mankind may implore.

A symphony of life in every tree,
No battles fought for territory.
The rivers flow with a tranquil ease,
A stark contrast to man's unease.

Man, with the power to create,
Yet often wields it with darker fate.
In nature's arms, a lesson found,
To nurture, not destroy, on sacred ground.

So let us learn from nature's lore,
Embrace the love that life implores.
In the tapestry of Earth's grand art,
Find the peace that lies in every heart

https://www.facebook.com/thelisteningplanet/

Man Verus Nature

The sounds of a new day in the African bush. This album was recorded in Northern Tuli Game Reserve in Botswana and features the diverse sounds of birds and wildlife in an ecotone of mopane woodland and arid savanna.

Botswana: Dawn in Tuli Wilderness

Botswana: Dawn in Tuli Wilderness - Album Sample

Let’s take a trip. We’re going to start in southwestern Europe and drive as far as we can go into the Arctic, following the annual migration of north-bound birds, photographing and recording them along the way. Then, we’ll turn our vehicles around, this time starting in southwestern Europe and following those same birds as far south as we can go, across the Strait of Gibraltar into Morocco and driving south along the west coast of Africa, all the way to Capetown, a distance of 12,000 kilometers. 

Sounds kind of daunting, doesn’t it? Perhaps; but that’s precisely the trip that Ario and Axel Drioli have undertaken. Axel is a wildlife sound recordist; his brother, Ario, is a photographer and cinematographer. I caught up with them and asked them to introduce themselves and tell us about themselves and their trip.

Episode 225: Wings Across Continents with Axel And Ario Drioli

CAMP 2019 - Red Deer Rutting Season - Chris Watson course. Tawny Owl in light rainfall.

Tawny Owl In Light Rainfall. Aulus-les-Bains, France, 2019.

Cold nights and warmer sunny days causes stress on thick lake ice. As the ice freezes and melts on a daily basis, periodic cracking and pinging sounds can be heard, sometimes quite dramatically. This track is edited from an all night recording made at a lake in south Estonia, a "greatest cracks" if you will, from more than 6 hours of material.

Cracking Lake Ice

Frogs in the first weeks of activity of the year. It was the warmest night so far, unusually high and although I went to the lake's edge, they were so loud that they could be heard from a long distance. This is also a place to see and hear herons and sometime storks, but this night it was all for the frogs.
I was testing out a Zoom F3 for the second time.

Frogs in the Countryside

Nature recordings, primarily from the western United States.  For the stories behind my recordings, visit my blog: www.wildmountainechoes.com.

Turkey Roost

Wild Mountain Echoes

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