If you're unfamiliar with the app, you can start recording on your phone and it will tell you in real time which birds are singing nearby. I haven't used it for positive identifications, just for knowing which birds are nearby. I've had numerous experiences already where a species I had no idea about was nearby, then a few minutes of looking confirmed the species it had identified. If you're a birder and you haven't tried Merlin, I highly encourage you to give it a try. It has also opened my eyes to a few species that spend almost all their time in the canopy and in heavy brush, which are really hard to spot unless you know they're around, and make time to look for them in those areas.
Using the Merlin app has also led to interesting conversations with people about how ML models work. People assume there's a bank of recordings that the app is constantly comparing your live recording against, which I don't believe is the case. The "bird packs" you have to download do contain a bunch of sound files, but those are available so you can play songs for birds you're interested in. I don't believe the identification algorithm is actively using those recordings.
[0] https://www.amazon.com/Big-Year-Tale-Nature-Obsession/dp/145...
[1] https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1053810/?ref_=ttfc_fc_tt
[2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JCBAP2wId5M&ab_channel=Rotte...
Just under nine thousand to go. It really is a life long quest.
Though the obsessive ones get celebrated it seems like a kind of madness, I wonder if they even enjoy it.
I do like photographing birds. So I’ll often bring my camera.
Once and while you’ll see something different like a heron catching fish.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/acomjean/9661826854/in/photost...
But a lot of times it’s just different ducks. https://www.flickr.com/photos/acomjean/50990143647/in/photos...
https://www.birdandmoon.com/comic/four-seasons-of-bird-watch...
Most areas of naturalism require digging deep and obsessing over minutiae to unearth new discoveries.
[1] https://www.inaturalist.org/observations?place_id=any&user_i...
Ha, that’s exactly how I describe mushrooming. You might find it similarly satisfying, though if you plan on foraging for food I recommend taking a course on identification (most communities have a mycology club) and sticking to the basics.
Ages ago, archeologists would join their country's diplomatic service for the chance to be paid to travel and live in far corners and dig. Peter joined the Foreign Service to bird, for much the same reason. Not much of a carbon footprint to hop in a car and visit neighboring countries. It's what we all did, to see the sights. But Peter did it to see birds.
A very, very nice man. I worked with him for over a year before I was told his status in the birding community, and I didn't hear it from Peter - he didn't talk about birds in the office: hardly anyone that was not his close friend knew he was an obsessive.
But again, to your point. The government ferried us around the world and dropped us off in interesting places where we lived for generally, about 3 years and then moved on. He took advantage of that and I would imagine his footprint is about the same as anyone who takes a car to see the neighboring sights on a weekend.
