11th of February 2023.    I was not sure if  would go out early to record as I both wanted and not wanted to go at the same time, sometimes I feel like that.  If I was going to get up I would need to wake at 4.50am.  
I usually have the radio on for a lot of the night it helps me to sleep.  I woke to a Led Zeppelin track, so what time was it ?  4.49am, so I thought that seeing that I woke at the right time I would get up.  Got out of bed at 4.53am.  Left home for Ballinvally woods at 5.55am, arrived at 6.21am.  The birds began to sing and call at 6.52am.  A nearby Songthrush sang really well, so I got a nice close perspective recording.  After this I recorded various sounds in the area.  A lot of jets went over, so I gave up and went home, left at 8.05am, got back at 8.33am.  It was a calm dry cloudy morning.  I used only the MixPre3 and the Rode NTG-8 gun microphone (No second recording rig/Drop rig).  This Soundcloud track was made up from four of the five recordings, a sort of medley of the mornings work.  
Picture by, hedera.baltica from Wrocław, Poland, CC BY-SA 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

The Birdsong Season Opens - 11 Feb 2023, Early Morning, Ballinvally.

Saturday the 15th of April 2023.   Got out of bed at 3.57am, on the road at 4.55am, arrived at Ballinvally at 5.23am.  
I worked out how to use the new X8 recorder (Tascam), so I brought it along.  First I set up the Lewitt 440's, at the end of 30 meters of mic cable,  plugged into the MixPre3 with a gain of 63db.  Went down to near the stream and set up the Tascam X8 with the Rode NT4 microphone with the Cardioid capsules, the gain set to 55db.  Finally I set up the Tascam Dr100Mk3 with the NT2A's set to Omni, with the gain set to 55db, I had this recorder set to 16-bit by mistake.   The forecast was good, it was clear and dry, they gave it to be 4C, but it felt much higher than that, more like 8C. It was fairly noisy with lots of jets going over or at least in the area.  It was an uneventful morning, after awhile I felt it was getting too noisy so I packed up and went home, left at 7.19am, home at 7.45am.  Recording 3951.

Dawn Chorus (2) - 15th of April 2023 - 5.52am - Ballinvally - Lewitt 440s

This is a very high-gain recording, the forests are so quiet in this part of Sweden, I like the idea of really opening up the gain.  MixPre3 the gain set to 74db, with a pair of Lewitt 440's.  Recording 4000.

Stream (1) -  12 May 23 - 11am - Dalsvallen

Tuesday the 25th of July 2023.  Got out of bed at 3.06am.  On the road at 4.03am, arrived at a place west of Kilcarra (South County Wicklow Ireland) at 4.26am.  Thought I was too early but some Swallows were twittering strongly just inside a field at a crumbling Ivy covered wall.  I decided to go into the area surrounded by ruins of farm buildings and see what was about.  Some jets flew over but eventually I got reasonably close to a Swallow that was twittering.  I could see I wasn't going to have much success there because the area had high weeds and moving about quietly and even safely was impossible, I didn't know what lumps or metal or other things might be among the weeds to trip me, I had reason to believe there might be, also the dew was wetting my feet.   Back out on the road again I walked on quietly to see what was about, then opposite a house was a Yellowhammer in song, to my surprise I got really close to him and recorded for about seven minutes, I could still hear the river that was a few kilometres away, however I was happy to at least get close to this bird.  Further on I tried for a Robin but the noise from the motorway was breaking through so I had to give up. 
On the way he  back the Yellowhammer was still there and singing I saw that he was perched on a small tree stump, he saw me and flew away, I could see that the angle I had approached him to record was just right, a few weeds and some bramble hid him from seeing me, had I approached from another angle to record he would have seen me and flown away.  That area is really good for Yellowhammers.  Nearer the car a Magpie, (perhaps there was two of them) began to cackle loudly, so I pointed the gun mic at them, they were 'only' Magpie however it was fun to have a go.  They fell silent, I moved closer, I knew the bird or birds would not move out of there without making a racket and I was right, after 2m37 (I timed it later), the bird suddenly made a loud alarm sort of call and flew away, thought the level had gone too high but what could I do, time to go home, it was getting far too noisy. 
It was a mostly clear, near calm, cool morning around 13C.  Later during processing I was glad to see that that alarm ?  call had not gone too high.  also I cut out some of the 2m37 so as not to have a long wait between calls with nothing happening.  I was glad also that some of the Yellowhammer song was usable, the distant swish noise is mostly the river at Woodenbridge.  Left for home at 5.31am, arrived back at 5.49am.  Equipment; a Sound Devices MixPre3 and a Rode NTG-8 full length gun mic.   Recording 4078.

Magpie loud alarm call - 25 July 2023 - 5.25am

During the first week of September 2023 I returned to Palupohja in the Alam Pedja reserve in Estonia for a short break before the autumn really begins and the days become short and cold.  Early in 2020 I was booked to go but then Covid struck and I had to cancel the trip.  It was good to meet up again with fellow wildlife sound recordists Andrus Kannel and Veljo Runnel and also Robert who runs the place.  I was booked-in for only a few days so I didn't want to be weighed-down with equipment so I brought only the Sound Devices - MixPre3 and the Tascam X8 recorders and a pair of Lewitt 440 and a pair of Primo EM272 microphones. 

A few years ago I was there in August from about the 8th to the 14th, I recorded mainly cricket choruses in the evenings and early nights, I recorded also in the early mornings but didn't get many recordings, at least not enough similar recordings to make any new production.  Very diverse recordings are hard to put together in a way that would sound like they were all made at the same time of day.  This trip however, though I only got about six hours of recordings, they are very alike and when I got home I was pleasantly surprised what I was able to make of them, the quiet background in each made it easy to cross-fade from one recording to the next.  I would like to thank Andrus for the lift out to the reserve from Tartu and his help with the name for this production.  Hilissuvi is an Estonian word that basically means the time of year that is the late summer and also the early autumn.  There is no English word for it. 

For the moment I will leave it as a free download but when I  put it on my Bandcamp page I will have to uncheck the free download box.

Hilissuvi (1) New Album

When it comes to recording, 2023 was an odd season, my trip to Sweden was not successful from a recording point of view, then at home I have two main recording locations, Ballinvally and Rosahane Graveyard, for various reasons the recording in Ballinvally was not very successful, however the trips up to the graveyard were much better and I am very pleased with those recordings.  I love the purity of the silence there, the birds even seem to sing more beautifully in the uplands for some reason.  Maybe it has something to do with the air being more thin at altitude.   All these sounds were recorded with Lewitt 440's and usually a Sound Devices MixPre3 recorder.

The Uplands - Morning (1).

I had not been to my usual recording location for a few months and I wanted to see what was around up there and maybe even record a Robin or Blackbird, so at around 4.08pm I set off for Ballinvally woods and just waited around to see what would happen, a lot of jets went over.  All I recorded was a Robin singing from the top of a small tree.  I heard some Blackbirds and Songthrush call but didn't get close to any of them.  It was a clear cool calm late afternoon/evening.  Got back home at 6.08pm.  Recording 4113.  Equipment; A Sound Devices MixPre 3 recorder and a Rode NTG-8 gun mic.

Robin - Song, 4th of January 2024 - 4.57pm - Ballinvally

It was a beautiful Sunday afternoon and I thought it a pity not to head out and go for a walk in the sun.  I got talking with my neighbour and so by the time we were finished the afternoon was nearly over, so I decided to go recording in the early evening instead.  I left at 5.07pm and arrived at Ballinvally (Near Arklow, County Wicklow, Ireland) woods at about 5.35pm.  I brought the long gun mic (The Rode NTG-8 Mic) and the MixPre3.  No bird sang for any good period of time and the noise in the area was awful, many aircraft roared over, a bull in a shed bashed about quite a lot, two cars went by and a distant motorbike could be heard sometimes, surprised I recorded anything at all !  
I love the sounds of birds in the evenings during the gathering gloom.  I find the more gloomy and near darkness the more interesting the sound.
This track was made from two recordings (4118 & 4119).  When going through the tracks I was really surprised to hear what I think may be an Owl, this is at 1m12 to 1m16, then after this at 1m59 to 2m01 a hawk calls too.  It was a really mild day, warm for the time of year, the evening was mild too.  
This track should be listened to at a low level.

Evening Chorus - 18Feb24 - 6pm, Ballinvally Woods.

Here is a track I should have posted last year.  It is an experimental recording I made near Dalsvallan (Near Sveg) Sweden.  I had the new Lewitt 440 Pure microphones and I wanted to see how far I could push the gain before noise became noticeable as they have a noise level of 7db.  The sound of the breeze in the treetops somewhat masks the mic/amp noise, however the gain on the MixPre3 was at the very high level of 74db, still the quality is really good.  Where I recorded this is nearer the mountain than in the picture but will give you an idea of what the area was like.  You might just make out a house just below the middle of the picture, this is the area where I stayed for three weeks.  Recording 3986.

Forest atmosphere & wind - 7th of May 2023 at 4.51pm, Dalsvallan

Though I record birdsong, if I get the chance I like to record people talking about their lives.  Recorded with a Beyer dynamic M58 microphone going into a Sound Devices MixPre3.  Recording 4122.

Delia Byrne (2) 5th of March 2024 at 2.28pm - Arklow

Though I record birdsong, if I get the chance I like to record people talking about their lives. Recorded with a Beyer dynamic M58 microphone going into a Sound Devices MixPre3. Recording 4121.

Delia Byrne (1) 5th of March 2024 at 2.11pm - Arklow

I have been visiting and recording in Ballyfad wood a long time but recently found an area that has some wonderful big Beech trees along with some oaks.  This is in the south-west end.  Some trails have been put in and a lot of them have even been covered in gravel, makes it very easy to get around.  The mornings have opened up enough with regard to day length and birdsongs for me to begin to go out recording again  (This is the same wood that I recorded Aubade, that area is near to the north entrance though).  On St Patricks day it nearly always rains and when I arrived, there was still drops falling from the trees, so I had to find a spot out from under the tree canopy.  A few jets went over at the start of the recording, but gladly after that it quietened down.  While waiting around I heard a Chiffchaff in song, the first one I have heard this year.  I got a good twenty minute stretch of recording in before another jet went over, but for once it was good timing because just then it began to rain, so I packed up the gear and went home, the dawn chorus had come to an end anyway.  Ballyfad wood is in the north of County Wexford, Ireland.  Equipment; A pair of lewitt 440's and a Sound Devices MixPre3 recorder set to 48/24.  It was a fairly cool misty damp morning.  The picture is from very near to the recording location and shows two of the huge Beech trees.  Recording 4123.

Dawn Chorus - 17th of March 2024 at 6.26am - Ballyfad Wood

I wanted to try out the 32bit floating point feature of the Tascam X8 recorder and also ever since I found this hollow, low ground part of the woods I have been there a few times, it is probably the most wild part, I really like it.  There is a small pond and some huge Beech trees there too. This place is not very far from a motorway and normally I can't record there, however this hollow area makes it possible as any slight swish of traffic goes overhead, though it is important that there is a drift of air going against any noise.  Recorded with a pair of Lewitt 440's going into a Tascam X8 recorder.  As it happened the levels were perfect, so I didn't need to pull down any levels afterwards.  Recorded in Ballyfad wood, county Wexford Ireland.  Recording 4129.

Dawn Chorus (2) 22nd of March 2024 - 6.08am - Ballyfad Wood

I wanted to try out the 32bit floating point feature of the Tascam X8 recorder and also ever since I found this hollow, low ground part of the woods I have been there a few times, it is probably the most wild part, I really like it.  There is a small pond and some huge Beech trees there too. This place is not very far from a motorway and normally I can't record there, however this hollow area makes it possible as any slight swish of traffic goes overhead, though it is important that there is a drift of air going against any noise.  Recorded with a pair of Lewitt 440's going into a Tascam X8 recorder.  As it happened the levels were perfect, so I didn't need to pull down any levels afterwards.  Recorded in Ballyfad wood, county Wexford Ireland.  Recording 4128.

Dawn Chorus (1) 22nd of March 2024 - 5.50am - Ballyfad Wood

I found this new place to record, it was worth at least one morning to try see if there was anything around.  I set up two recorders, only the drop rig recorder (The Tascam X8 & the Rode Nt4) captured anything worthwhile.  In the distance are a lot of calf's roaring (In the sheds of the Wicklow calf company).  I put this track together from three recordings.  I found that all three good parts of the long recording, whenever a good lot of birdsongs got going a jet would come along and ruin it.  Early on there was this cloud that was lit from the dawn sun, got a picture with the phone.  A nearby stream makes a lot of noise.

Morning Chorus - 30th of March 2024 Near the New Line Road

Got out of bed at 3.50am.  On the road at 4.46am, arrived at Ballyfad wood at 5.01am, it was then about a nine minute walk to the recording location.  Set up the three recorders, first the Tascam X8 with the Rode Nt4 stereo mic with the Cardioid capsules (52db gain).  Next the Tascam Dr100 Mk2 with the Warm Audio 84's (50db gain), strangely I get problems with these mics if I use them with the MixPre3, but they seem to work beautifully with the Tascam).  Finally I set up the MixPre3 with the MKH8020's, I had not been using these mics for quite awhile as I thought they had gone faulty, but it seems to not be the case.  The weather had been awful for so long, very wet and windy and though the drift of air was not from the best direction I still went for recording even though I could hear a small bit of swish from traffic coming from the motorway.  It was as more about experimenting and checking out the equipment as getting the best recordings, though that would be a bonus.  It was a cool morning, about 5C, near calm, dry and clear.  Left for home at 7.14am, arrived back at 7.31am.   Out of the seven recordings saved from the three long recordings from the three recorders, I like the Warm Audio results the best, they sound so thick and analogue, the levels on screen are very noticeably bigger and thicker than the other recordings, these two are uploaded here.  Recording  4134.

Dawn Chorus (4) 18th of April 2024 - 6.06am - Ballyfad Wood (Warm Audio 84's)

Got out of bed at 3.50am.  On the road at 4.46am, arrived at Ballyfad wood at 5.01am, it was then about a nine minute walk to the recording location.  Set up the three recorders, first the Tascam X8 with the Rode Nt4 stereo mic with the Cardioid capsules (52db gain).  Next the Tascam Dr100 Mk2 with the Warm Audio 84's (At 50db gain), strangely I get problems with these mics if I use them with the MixPre3, but they seem to work beautifully with the Tascam).  Finally I set up the MixPre3 with the MKH8020's, I had not been using these mics for quite awhile as I thought they had gone faulty, but it seems to not be the case.  The weather had been awful for so long, very wet and windy and though the drift of air was not from the best direction I still went for recording even though I could hear a small bit of swish from traffic coming from the motorway.  It was as more about experimenting and checking out the equipment as getting the best recordings, though that would be a bonus.  It was a cool morning, about 5C, near calm, dry and clear.  Left for home at 7.14am, arrived back at 7.31am.   Out of the seven recordings saved from the three long recordings from the three recorders, I like the Warm Audio results the best, they sound so thick and analogue, the levels on screen are very noticeably bigger and thicker than the other recordings, these two are uploaded here.  Recording 4132.

Dawn Chorus (2) 18th of April 2024 at 5.39am - Ballyfad Wood (Warm Audio 84's)

20th of April 2024.  Got up at 3.48am.  On the road at 4.54am, got to Ballyfad wood (South entrance) at 5.09am.   The birds had already begun to sing even though it was still nearly dark.  At the recording spot I set up the Warm Audio 84's going into the Tascam Dr100 Mk3 at a gain of 50db.  About 40 meters further on I set up the Lewitt 440's going into the Tascam X8 at about 45db gain, I turned it down as the Lewitts are far more sensitive than the Nt4 used the other day.  I had the pointing away from the slight swish noise of distant traffic that could be heard sometimes.  It was a beautiful morning, cool, clear, dry and calm, any drift of air was in a somewhat more favourable westerly direction compared with the more southerly drift the other day.  That is how there was somewhat less traffic noise breaking through compared with the 18th April, but then there was a lot more disturbance from aircraft, compared with the 18th.    This area has a small pond surrounded by a lot of oak and pine with some big Beech trees nearby.  The picture is from the recording location.  Recording 4139.  Tascam X8  & Lewitt 440's.

Dawn Chorus (2) 20th April 2024 - 5.47am - Ballyfad Wood.

20th of April 2024.  Got up at 3.48am.  On the road at 4.54am, got to Ballyfad wood (South entrance) at 5.09am.   The birds had already begun to sing even though it was still nearly dark.  At the recording spot I set up the Warm Audio 84's going into the Tascam Dr100 Mk3 at a gain of 50db.  About 40 metres further on I set up the Lewitt 440's going into the Tascam X8 at about 45db gain, I turned it down as the Lewitts are far more sensitive than the Nt4 used the other day.  I had the pointing away from the slight swish noise of distant traffic that could be heard sometimes.  It was a beautiful morning, cool, clear, dry and calm, any drift of air was in a somewhat more favourable westerly direction compared with the more southerly drift the other day.  That is how there was somewhat less traffic noise breaking through compared with the 18th April, but then there was a lot more disturbance from aircraft, compared with the 18th.    This area has a small pond surrounded by a lot of oak and pine with some big Beech trees nearby.  The picture is from the recording location.  Tascam DR100-Mk3 & Warm Audio 84's.  It is interesting to compare the sound of this recording with the one (Next) made with the Lewitt 440's.  The picture shows the small pond where the WA84's were set up.  Recording 4138.

Dawn Chorus (1) 20th April 2024 - 5.37am - Ballyfad Wood.

Got up out of bed at 3.07am.  On the road at 4.12am, arrived at Ballyfad wood at 4.28am.  There was a slight north-westerly drift of air, this was perfect as the motorway is only 2.75 Km away from the recording spot.  The pond area is 6.2Km away from my home.   First I set up the Warm Audio 84's at the bottom of some steep ground, that I felt should completely shield the mics from any traffic noise, coming in from the east, seemed quiet when I set them up with the Tascam DR100-Mk3, at a gain of 48db.  I left that rig there and clambered up the steep ground and went around to the valley where I set up the Lewitt 440's and the Tascam X8.  I could hear little or no noise from the direction of the motorway, this was a change, however after awhile I could hear swishing noises coming from the opposite direction, as time passed swishes could be heard almost continuously, this was disappointing, all the effort to get up early and make it out, only to have the recordings ruined.  On the plus side there were few jets that morning.   The car thermometer on the way there and back showed it was only 4C, though it felt more like 7C.  It was a cool, clear, dry, almost calm morning.   Left for home at 7am, back home at 7.14am.   Later while processing the recordings, I found that the first 12 minutes or so of the Lewitt recording was free from noises, the Warm Audio set up picked up some swish noise all the time, not sure what it was.  Here is that Lewitt 440's recording. The Wrens singing is really strong throughout, I am glad I had the recorder set to 32bit floating point, as I needed to pull back levels by nearly 5db during processing.  Recording 4145.

Dawn Chorus (3) 24th of April 2024-5.33am - Ballyfad Wood

I am on bandcamp.com now
Two Thrush Nightingales in song.  Recorded at night beginning at 2.05am on the 20th of May 2013, in Soomaa National Park, Estonia.  This is the third of three recordings.  Some months ago I uploaded this same recording but a shorter version in 44khz/16bit, this recording is the full-length 48Khz/24Bit version.  Equipment; A matched pair of Sennheiser MKH8020 microphones, a Sound Devices MixPre microphone pre-amp and a Marantz PMD661 solid state recorder.
Recording 2502.
To help you find my other albums, here is a list of the names of the albums as sound cloud is not structured in such a way as to make it easy to find material that is a long way down or at the bottom of the page, so it is easier to search for the albums if you know their names, here is a list.
Put any of these names in the search bar and press enter.  
Central America . . . Belize.
Garden of songs.  	Forest Home.	  Out of the blue.
Jungle report.	Wild enough.	  Na Luum Ca - revisited.

South America . . . Brazil.
Xixuau   (2 disc production).
South America . . . Guyana.
Karanambu.	   Iwokrama.
South America . . . Peru   (4 disc production).
Otorongo.     	  Tahuayo. 
Europe . . . Finland.
Natures Song.	  At the blue moment.
Europe . . . Estonia.
Soomaa.
Europe . . . Wales / Ireland.
Morning Birds 3.	
Europe . . . Ireland.
Morning Birds 1 and 2.	  The joy of birdsong.	  Birds of the great Saltee.   Saltee Revisited.		Songs of silence.		Aubade.
More Suburban Birds.		 Suburban Birds (This one was never uploaded to sound cloud).

2 Thrush Nightingales - The 48khz/24Bit version

Track One of two from disc 4 of 4 from my new album of Peru sounds. This disc covers the evening and night sounds from about 6pm to 6am.  I recorded so much material from a five week visit to Peru (In March - April 2014) that I decided there was too much material to fit onto one CD, so I went for a four disc production.   One covers the early morning, 2 covers the mid and later morning, 3 the afternoon and this disc for the night.  Parts one to three are further down on the main page.  

Otorongo And Tahuayo - Track 1 of 2

A Great Tit in song, recorded in my garden on the 7th of May 1991.  They were the days when I could record so very close to home, not like that now.  Recording 542.
Picture by; Jacob Spinks from Northamptonshire, England (Great Tit) [CC BY 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

Great Tit - song

2826-Nightingale5May2016-2205Palupohja.  10m55.  Rated 8 (Out of 9). The bird is quite close.  After the first minute he moves away a bit.  The distant Snipe sounds great even though it is at low level.  At 3m10 or so he moves back left of center.  At around 8m30 some distant voices.  Mallard Duck can be heard now and again.  The sound level on the Nightingale becomes lower and lower towards the end.   Recorded at the end of the school garden, in the Alam Pedja reserve, Estonia.   GPS = 58.42140°N - 26.23394°E.
To help you find my albums, here is a list of the names of them as sound cloud is not structured in such a way as to make it easy to find material that is a long way down or at the bottom of the page, so it is easier to search for the albums if you know their names, here is a list.

Put any of these names in the search bar and press enter.

Central America . . . Belize.
Garden of songs.
Forest Home.
Out of the blue.
Jungle report.
Wild enough.
Na Luum Ca - revisited.

South America . . . Brazil.
Xixuau (2 disc production).
South America . . . Guyana.
Karanambu.
Iwokrama.
South America . . . Peru (4 disc production).
Otorongo.
Tahuayo.
Europe . . . Finland.
Natures Song.
At the blue moment.
Europe . . . Estonia.
Soomaa.
Europe . . . Wales / Ireland.
Morning Birds 3.
Europe . . . Ireland.
Morning Birds 1.
Morning Birds 2.
The joy of birdsong.
Birds of the great Saltee.
Saltee Revisited.
Songs of silence.
Aubade.
Suburban Birds (This one was never uploaded to sound cloud).
More Suburban Birds.


Nightingale Song - Palupohja

Village atmosphere with Fieldfare and Great Tit. Recorded at 4.37am on the 9th of May2017 in the village of Palupohja in the Alam Pedja reserve Estonia.  There was a light breeze sometimes, so the mics were placed behind an old abandoned house, same as in the picture, so the scratching noises sometimes may be mice inside or birds outside.  Equipment; A pair of Sennheiser MKH8020 microphones, a Sound Devices MixPre microphone pre-amp and a Marantz PMD661 solid state recorder.  Recording 2987.  This is a 48 Khz / 24 bit recording (It is your lucky day !  )

Village Dawn Chorus with Great Tit - 9 May 2017 - 4.37am - 48/24

A dawn chorus of birds recorded in the little meadow a small clearing in the forest.  I like how the birdsound gently reverberates through the forest.  
Recorded at 4.24am on the 12th of May 2017 in the Alam Pedja reserve Estonia, just south of the Nature School at Palupohja.  A cold morning around -1˚C.  Very calm with the mist hanging over the open spaces as I returned to the house.  Equipment; A pair of Sennheiser MKH8020 microphones, a Sound Devices MixPre microphone pre-amp and a Marantz PMD661 solid state recorder.  Made at 48/24.  Recording 2997.

Dawn Chorus - 12 May 2017 - 4.24am

Stream.  7th of July 2017 at 4.50am.  in a wood south of Woodenbridge west of Arklow County Wicklow, Ireland.  Recording 3055.

Stream - 7July2017 - 4.50am.

Track 1 of 27.
Dawn Chorus, beginning at 4.29am on the 1st of May 2017.  Duration 9m15.  Recorded in Pille’s field near to the picnic area and toilets.  A cold morning (-2°C) but perfectly calm.  Very few species present, yet there is something very attractive about this sound, somewhat melancholy, a feeling of bare boards,  yet so beautiful.   At 2m24 a Great Tit begins to sing and keeps singing till 7m24.  There was frost on the tripod by the time I got back to the house.
Species present; Blackbird, Redwing, Robin, Great Tit, Common Crane and some distant Black Grouse.    
Recording 2951.
These recordings have been arranged to fit nicely onto three Cds, the f.l.a.c format files have been named beginning with the track number, then the ‘A’ ‘B’ or ‘C’ is to show which CD they belong to. . . 1,2, or 3.  If you are making a CD copy, the f.l.a.c. files will need to be converted from 48Khz / 24 Bit to 44Khz / 16 Bit wav’s as a lot of CD burning software will not recognise f.l.a.c. format.  
If you have the equipment to play the 48/24 - f.l.a.c. files you will be getting the full quality as this is the same sample and bit rate the originals were made at.  
	In some recordings you will hear what sounds like distant Geese or Swans calling and flapping vigorously.  But having consulted my sound guides I do not feel confident enough to name them, 
that is why they are not in the species list.
	All recordings were made in the Alam Pedja reserve Estonia, in areas in or south of Palupohja during May 2017.  In nearly every case the recordings follow the order in which they were made.  So this production follows the journey of my time in Alam Pedja. 
	I tend not to remember the exact weather conditions as I am usually too focused on recording. Provided it is not windy, then the details about the weather conditions do not get recorded in my blog.  
It is a great privilege to be in a position to take a full month off and devote it to my hobby/passion.  The material I recorded is so different to what I got the previous year even though most of the places I recorded in where the same, for instance I didn’t hear any powerful dawn choruses as I did in 2016.  I discovered a few new places in the reserve, this gave me new opportunities for recording.  Noticeable too was the places where the main sound activity had moved around, for instance the river bank near the nature school during the 2016 trip was a hive of activity, in 2017 there was hardly a sound to be heard there during the night, but I found later in the trip that a similar soundscape I had heard in 2016 could still be recorded but had simply moved down river a few hundred meters.  
	Most recordings were made with a matched pair of Sennheiser MKH 8020 radio frequency microphones, a Sound Devices ‘MixPre’ microphone pre-amplifier and a Marantz PMD661 solid state recorder, set to 48Khz / 24 Bit.  For a few recordings I used a Rode NT-4 Stereo microphone (Disc 2 - track 9) and sometimes a pair of Rode NT2A’s (Disc 2 - track 3).  
On this trip I was so glad to meet up with a fellow wildlife recordist  - Ivar Vinkel, Patrick Mc Guinley (he is the guy behind Framework radio), Veljo Runnel and Andrus Kannel.
My thanks to Veljo Runnel for naming the Spider.  
	I also had the interesting experience of having an online article written about me.   Jacob’s (Robert’s son) friend Triin wrote the piece.   
	Fellow recordist Andrus Kannel gave me a lift out to Alam Pedja.   Great to get back to the Nature School in Palupohja, Robert met me at the door, it was like coming home.  Happily I got to use the old room I was in the spring before and not only that, but a bed had been got, so no-more sleeping on the floor, there was even candles lighting in the room, (wonder did he see me coming and light them ?).  The old shelves I had erected were still there.  They had got in a washing machine and also fairly high-speed internet broadband.

Heart Of Alam Pedja - track 1 of 27

After weeks of constant wind, I finally got a calm spell of weather and so I was able to begin the seasons recording.  This is one of two evening chorus recordings made in Ballinvally wood north of Arklow, County Wicklow Ireland.  22nd of March 2020 beginning at 6.55pm.    Recording 3323.  Sennheiser MKH 8020 microphones and a Sound Devices MixPre-3 recorder.

Evening Chorus - 22 March 2020 - 6.55pm - Ballinvally Woods.

I like to leave the (Now) old Marantz recorder with the Rode NT4 stereo microphone out in the woods recording while I go away nearby to record with the MixPre3 and 8020's.   I love the 'not knowing' what it has captured while I was away.  usually it captures something useful, often it gets a lot of great material.  This Blackbird came quite close to the microphone, the level reached about minus 5db.  This is part of a longer recording.  Recording 3405.  My thanks to Pixabay and user Gellinger-201217, for the picture of the Blackbird.  Recorded in Ballinvally Wood near Arklow, County Wicklow, Ireland.

Blackbird alarm calls - 14 June 20 - 9.27pm

I am having an interesting time with my new contact microphones.  I attached one to a large pine tree.  Recorded with a J.R.F. contact microphone and a MixPre3 recorder.  Recorded on the 3rd of October 2020 at 12.53pm in Ballinvally woods near Arklow County Wicklow Ireland.  Recording 3444.

Large Tree - Contact microphone

A cabinetmaker by trade.  I have been recording birds for over 40 years.  Even as a seven year old I loved to hear the sound of birds. 
I believe that birdsong is a perfect reflection of the natural environment and yet a part of the experience of the environment.  
Over the years I have made some wildlife films and videos.  For wildlife recording I have been around Ireland, Wales, Finland, Estonia, Sweden, Belize, Guyana, Brazil, Peru and Costa Rica. At the moment I have 26 albums of birdsong/nature, most of which can be found here for free download in high quality F.L.A.C. format.
  
Birdsong is Spiritual Medicine,
a Natural Treasure 
and a Companion to Silence.

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