Listening to bird song

We recently became family members of the RSPB and Luath became a wild explorer.  One of the articles I read in the welcome pack included information on a scheme called wild square (free).

You choose a 1km location and through the year there are different surveys that you can do within that area (you can change location).  We selected an area that starts at our house and includes the areas of our daily walks. When I went to register I discovered that the youngest year a child could be born on the registration form is 2007, which I thought was a bit old when it is aimed at families.  Anyway Luath has suddenly become 6!

The current survey involves counting how many of a few specified birds you see, listening out for four specific bird songs and noting any other bird sounds. 

So that we were familiar with the four specific bird songs, I played each one of the songs on the RSPB site, blackbird page here.  Luath got quite excited each time I played a clip, saying “oh I hear it”. I wasn’t sure I would remember exactly how each bird sounded so I took a short video clip on my camera of each bird song.  It also meant that just before we went out for our walk I could replay the videos without having to switch on the computer.

Armed with our survey questions, a pencil and camera we headed out.  After a few moments we heard a bird singing and I knew it was one of our select four, although I wasn’t sure if it was a Great Tit or a Robin.  I took out the camera, played the Great Tit clip and bingo.  We didn’t hear any of the other three bird’s singing but did hear lots of other birds.

We have been looking out for blackbirds all week as we have been singing “sing a song of sixpence”,  we’ve only caught fleeting glimpses of a lady blackbird in our garden and they were still scare while we were on our adventure.

Listening out for certain birds wouldn’t have been an activity that I would have thought to do with Luath.  We often listen to the birds singing and mention if it is a bird that daddy or I definitely know (usually a seagull or heron!).  It is also quite a skill to tune into one song amongst other sounds.
 
Shared with Eco Kids via Organic Aspirations
(Luath is 25 months)