Last summer I went to see the Animals exhibition in London at the British Library, and there, whilst in the gift shop I came across a book called ‘A year of bird song – 52 stories of song birds’ and it inspired me more to get out and listen and make recordings all year.

In January 2024 I purchased a new parabolic microphone from nature-sound.it (made by Marco Pesente) and decided too take it for a walk up in the mountains, where I recorded various calls and drumming of Greater Spotted and Black Woodpeckers.

Although I’ve used parabolic in the past, investing in some new equipment was also nice and motivating to get out and start listening in new ways.

This was the moment I decided to act on this and begin my year of recording and listening to birds.

I like to undertake long-term projects, and this year I decided to improve my ‘birding by ear.’ In general I set out with the goal on dealing with my own questions of ‘presence’ as a field recordist. What it means to be there, or leaving microphone rigs overnight and what experiences do we miss or what can we take from this. I’m quite inspired by the use of field craft and long-term observation of species, often visiting places multiple times to fully understand what it is I hope to record.

The main goal was learning and growing in terms of learning equipment, understanding nature, observing field signs and practising recording more actively.

So far I’ve recorded in Bialowieza, where I was kindly invited by Izabela Dluzyk and Chris Watson as they made their work for Unsound and Ephmera Festivals, I will return there in September, the spring trip was setup as a residency previously but usually I work independently. It’s great to have such conversations with fellow nature sound recordists and there is a wide network across the globe – much can be learnt from just a shared experience in the field!

I’ve also recorded a few times in the Owl Mountains, as well as a few known birding spots around Wroclaw – where I recorded Long-Eared Owls, both adult and juveniles. This all had an element of chance, but also had a small amount of research of recommended birding spots.

I will also travel to Kos, a Greek island later in the year on a recording trip and hopefully locally in the UK more also. I have joined various groups on FB and made some light networking with other ornithologists or scientists, researchers and enthusiasts who reside there or visit the island on the regular.

All of these steps towards recording a place or species have supported by research of said place, investing in articles, or local printed guides, resources and also just general searching the internet for example using https://www.birdingplaces.eu/en and xeno-canto to find useful spots in my local area or abroad as well as ‘recces/location scouting’ – a shorter, more casual visit to get an idea of the error and possible locations to record without the burden of equipment.

You can see my progress so far and selected recordings I have uploaded to Soundcloud: