An ongoing exploration of, and meditation on, the lifeworld of mallee country.

Gluepot Reserve. Later Listenings.

An unedited excerpt, from the hour after sunrise, taken from a nocturnal and dawn recording made in mallee country in winter. Crested Bellbirds can be heard in the distance, along with Grey Butcherbirds. A few Australian Ravens arrive nearby, with their distinctive laconic calls. After a quiet but not silent interval (which I could not bring myself to edit out), a flock of White-winged Choughs arrive, with their highly contrasted calls: mellow, piping whistles, intermingled with harsh, rasping cries, and a few sharp bill claps. Towards the end of the excerpt can be heard the distinctive, repetitive two-note call of a Striated Pardalote.

Listening with good quality headphones in a quiet environment is highly recommended. (96/32 > 48/24. MKH 8020s AB 60cm > MixPre-6 II.)

Recorded on land of the Meru and Danggali peoples, which is now a private protected area known as Gluepot Reserve, purchased from pastoral lease in 1997 by BirdLife Australia (see www.gluepot.org/). The Reserve is also part of the Riverland Biosphere Reserve and the Riverland Mallee Important Bird Area.

2021.08.08 Ravens, then Choughs. Excerpt from a Mallee Dawn. Late Winter.

Grey Butcherbird calls, including flight/alarm calls as the birds pass close to the microphones. (Listening with good headphones is recommended, but don't turn the volume up too loud.) A montage of a few brief excerpts of louder Grey Butcherbird calls selected from a dawn recording made in mallee country during winter. Grey Butcherbirds belong to the same family as Currawongs, Australian Magpies (which are not truly 'magpies' but actually 'butcherbirds'), and White-winged Choughs. Their respective calls and songs are radically different from each other, but all are fascinating and beautiful.

In the background of this recording can also be heard the beautiful rhythmic calls of Crested Bellbirds (the first time I heard them, I referred to them as 'Morse code birds', until I learned their real identity). Each individual calls at a different pitch.

Recorded on land of the Meru and Danggali peoples, which is now a private protected area, known as Gluepot Reserve, purchased from pastoral lease in 1997 by BirdLife Australia (see www.gluepot.org/). The Reserve is also part of the Riverland Biosphere Reserve and the Riverland Mallee Important Bird Area. (96/32 > 48/24. MKH 8020s AB 60cm > MixPre-6 II.)

Track image: Grey Butcherbird, Gluepot Reserve. Courtesy of Michael Jury, Mykelphotography, https://www.mykelphotography.com.au/gluepot-adventures-and-images.

2021.08.08 Grey Butcherbirds. Mallee Country. Dawn. Late Winter.

One of those peculiar, unpredictable recordings when you just set up in a place that feels right and start recording, not knowing what, if anything, is going to happen. This is what happened when I set up my gear at around 15:00 on 8th August 2021 in the late winter mallee environment and lifeworld of Gluepot Reserve in South Australia. This is the entire recording, except for a few seconds of recordist noise trimmed off the head of the take. Above the buzzing and humming of insects, a Brown Falcon gradually approaches, with agitated-sounding calls, flying in wide looping circles, until it is spiralling overhead. Later in the recording, a Yellow-plumed Honeyeater calls out quietly from nearby, as if reacting to the cries of the Falcon.

While listening to this natural soundscape episode of life in the mallee  lifeworld unfurling, what came to mind was the well-known poem of William Butler Yeats, 'The Second Coming': in particular, the verse that refers to the winding or reeling "shadows of the indignant desert birds". At the time of recording, I didn't know that the bird whose voice I was recording was a Brown Falcon; I discovered that later, with some research. If I had known that, I would no doubt have first of all recalled the even more familiar verses, "Turning and turning in the widening gyre / The falcon cannot hear the falconer...". Yet, the far less familiar verse from the same poem seems, to me, far more appropriate, enigmatic, and suggestive, in so many ways. Hence the title of this recording.

Listening with good headphones is recommended.

A note on the track image: The image is (obviously) a composite. The background landscape is a photograph taken at the actual location of the recording, just after the recording ended. The superimposed foreground detail of the Brown Falcon in flight has been 'quoted' from an image provided by the Adelaide Ornithologists' Club (https://www.adelaideornithologists.com/uploads/2/1/6/9/21699228/2381314_orig.jpg). That photograph was taken in Western Australia. There are a couple of good photographs of a perched Brown Falcon that were taken within Gluepot Reserve also available at the same website (https://www.adelaideornithologists.com/uploads/2/1/6/9/21699228/6757807_orig.jpg ,https://www.adelaideornithologists.com/uploads/2/1/6/9/21699228/2731697_orig.jpg).  But this was the only good image they had of a Brown Falcon in flight.

2021.08.08 Indignant Brown Falcon. Mallee Country. Late Winter.

Recorded during the hour after sunrise. Night and dawn had been quite calm, but the wind picked up quite vigorously, yet peacefully, soothingly, with the rising sun, swirling and soughing through the clusters of fine needle-leaves of the Sheoaks (and occasionally also through the windjammers of the microphones). A White-browed Babbler couple are feeding, flitting from branch to branch and tree to tree, constantly communicating with each other with their distinctive and gorgeous churring, chucking and whistling calls, and, on their way, passing close to the microphones.

Listening with good headphones is recommended.

Track image: The background landscape is the location of the recording, photographed soon after the recording was made. The inset is a White-browed Babbler (Pomatostomus superciliosus), photographed by D. Newell at Gluepot Reserve on 25.09.2015 (https://www.adelaideornithologists.com/uploads/2/1/6/9/21699228/7770102_orig.jpg).

2021.09.19 Wind and White-browed Babblers in the Sheoaks. Mallee Country. Early Spring.

Arid mallee country is vast and flat. Although this large reserve is brimming with birdlife and bird species, and every dawn is typically rich with bird energy and variety, birds are very widely dispersed throughout the landscape.  Recording first light/dawn choruses, here, can be challenging, and the obvious and best choice for a wide perspective of this widely-dispersed activity is to use a pair of sensitive omnidirectional microphones. (Examples: https://soundcloud.com/hearingbeings/20200914-mallee-habitat-2-spring-before-sunrise-excerpt, https://soundcloud.com/hearingbeings/20200914-mallee-habitat-2-spring-after-sunrise-excerpt.)

Even so, much depends on a certain serendipity. As I’ve been learning from experience, no two dawns in the same location are likely to be very similar: much depends on seasonal, astronomical, and weather conditions, and which groups of birds happen to be present in, or passing through, a particular location on a particular morning. On one morning, one may be in the midst of vocal Ravens and White-winged Choughs; on another, the Choughs and Ravens may be only barely audible in the far distance, whereas Grey Butcherbirds, Brown Treecreepers and Bronzewings may grace the foreground. Even so, various species do tend to prefer congregating in specific (although fairly wide) regions, according to variations in the flora of the landscape. The location in which this excerpt (from a longer overnight to dawn recording) was recorded is especially frequented by Grey Butcherbirds.

Lately, I've been exploring this varied and variable landscape with a pair of cardioid microphones, which, with their shorter and more focussed range, are excellent for picking out a smaller sphere of local details from the expansive but spatially attenuated acoustic landscape (or, perhaps better expressed, lifeworld soundscape). This present recording is an example. The main focus, here, is a fascinating feature of Grey Butcherbird communication: the interlocking of sometimes different, sometimes similar, kinds of calls. A very common example of different kinds of calls is what, on the one hand, is often very poorly described – in accordance with the limited ‘human ear’ - as ‘cackling’ or ‘laughing’ (faintly reminiscent of kookaburra calls): in fact, these calls are complex and interesting; and, when pitch-dropped and slowed down, reveal much ‘musical’ or informational detail. On the other hand, these complex calls often alternate or interlock with very melodious phrases provided by another Grey Butcherbird. (At the beginning of this excerpt, the former type of call can be heard to the left, followed immediately by the latter kind, to the right.) This combination of ‘contrasts’ seems to shift into an alternation or interlocking of melodious calls, provided by both birds in the duet.

During this recording, a Grey Butcherbird providing the melodious calls in a duet perches on a dry log beside the microphones. In the distance can also be heard (most clearly) Brown Treecreepers; along with (more faintly) Common Bronzewings, Crested Bellbirds, White-winged Choughs, Australian Ravens, a Striated Pardalote, and an Owlet Nightjar, amongst others. 

Listening with good headphones in a quiet environment (with volume between around 60 to 70 per cent) is strongly recommended.

Recorded on land of the Meru and Danggali peoples, which is now a private protected area, purchased from pastoral lease in 1997 by BirdLife Australia (see https://www.gluepot.org/about-gluepot/introduction/). The Reserve is also part of the Riverland Biosphere Reserve and the Riverland Mallee Important Bird Area.

Dedicated to Ben Gerstein.

2021.09.19 Grey Butcherbird Duets at Sunrise. Mallee Country. Early Spring.

Listening with good quality headphones in a quiet environment is recommended.

2021.12.05 White-winged Choughs. Dawn. Mallee Country. Early Summer.

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Exploring hearing, the hearable, and the hearer, as an event, a mode, and a dimension of Βeing (τὸ εἶναι).

2021.12.05 White-winged Choughs. Dawn. Mallee Country. Early Summer.

Hearing Beings