Winter Recording in Sweden

Having decided to launch the podcast on New Year's Day, it seemed only fitting it should be themed on winter field recording. Here in Sweden, the landscape is harsh and cold in the depths of winter, but for the field recorder, this can be a rewarding time to venture out into the cold. Sub zero tempertures mean that crystal clear recordings can be made, with the wonderful sounds of freezing ice, falling snow and meltwater streams adding to the ambience of the Swedish countryside. Here, you can get lost in the woodlands and enjoy the sounds of winter. Silent, natural soundscapes can be enjoyed in serene settings. Immerse yourself in the sounds on Sweden during this wonderful season with Wild Bird Acoustic's....

Transcript

So welcome to wild bird acoustics, folks. I'm your host, Alan Dalton, and I'll be taking you on a journey into sound. 

  Winter is a harsh time here in Sweden. Snow is laden on the ground and the lakes are just covered in a thick layer of ice. And as a field recorder, you might think that there's very little reason to go out into the field, but in actual fact, if you do, the rewards are quite amazing.  As the landscape is actually stripped back into a dormant state.

Birdlife is greatly reduced here in Sweden and the vast majority of species actually leave the country for the winter. Now, living in Sweden over the last few years has actually led me to redefine what I think of as a migrant species. So, for example, when I lived in Ireland, I thought that Robben Dunk Blackbird species like that.

You know, there were non migratory and there was lots of these birds around the summer, around the winter. But here in Sweden, very much not the case. And a lot of these birds here in Sweden, they just leave and vacate the country. The species that stay tend to be very hardy species, like finches, like red poles or the woodpeckers, great tits, blue tits, species like that.

And. life is greatly reduced, and this might lead you to think, as a field recorder, there's no point to get out into the field, but you would be entirely wrong. And part of the reason for that is actually the conditions you get out in.  Now Sweden in the winter means cold conditions, and cold conditions, strangely enough, is are absolutely fantastic for field recording. 

Sound travels better in cold conditions and you get clear recordings and quite often it's quite incredible the soundscapes you can actually get without having a wide range of species. present in the area.  So despite the lack of species available you get wonderful acoustics, things such as snow falling through the trees, the cracking timbre of the voice and the trickle of meltwater streams through the woodland. 

Now I've made a special effort over the last couple of winters just to get out into the field and try and record. Now you just heard a recording of drumming lesser spotted woodpecker but the amazing thing about that recording was When I initially arrived at Lake Stenquirn in Tirist National Park in Sweden, I was looking for that spotted woodpecker  As it was one of the few species I expected to be in the area and I was really keen to record that species But natural fact, as often happens, when you listen closely in a landscape, there's an awful lot more going on And this was a case in point, so after recording the woodpeckers was sitting there recording the woodpeckers, I was listening to the soundscape behind me and on the lake, on Lake Stenquirnt, was a remarkable thing going on and that was a phenomenon that the Swedes call singing ice. 

So having already played you that recording of drumming less spotted woodpecker,  I'm actually going to go back now and replay something that I recorded straight afterwards. So this second soundscape, which I'm actually going to play for you now, is actually a result of sitting down quietly and listening to the landscape.

And I realized that the voice was contracting and making these incredible noises and I was like  To actually sit there, it was fantastic to listen to it, it was just reverberating across the lake, across the landscape and the woodpeckers were just a part of this. So what I did was, I had a new binaural recorder which I just made and I just left it out on the lake and just let it record.

And this second recording now is actually the sound of ice singing on Lake Stenquirn in Tirson National Park and it's a quite incredible recording. So this is the sound of ice contracting over Lake Stenquirn in Tirsa National Park. Have a listen to this folks. 

Now during the winter here in Sweden, bird species are quite limited. It's actually an excellent opportunity to record common species, such as this singing great tit.  I found this bird singing by another lake in Tirsten National Park. And despite being a common species, the background ambience of wind in this recording, with the wind coming through the trees and the clarity of the air, resulted in a wonderful recording. 

Have a listen. 

Not far away from the Great Tit, I found this wonderful Eurasian cistern, a male bird and song. The bird was just singing quietly from a small spruce tree, and I just stood quietly and recorded the bird with my parabola. 

Not all of my field recording these days is actually focused on birds, and I've been making an increasing effort over the last year or two. to record more soundscapes.  Whilst many of these will involve done choruses in the future, I will also stop to record any nice ambience I come across in the field. 

So I'll play one such recording now. It's a short excerpt of a longer recording and it involves the sounds of a small meltwater stream.  Towards the end of winter, as the thaw begins, Many small streams form here and there as water runs off the landscape and the snow melts. For those interested, I've started a dedicated YouTube channel for these longer soundscapes, which you'll find by simply searching Wild Bird Acoustics in the YouTube search box.

I'm hoping to add to this channel on a regular basis in the near future and throughout the summer, but for now, here's a recording of a meltwater stream at Naka Reserve. Here in Sweden. 

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Another classic group of winter species here in Sweden are the woodpeckers and greater spotted woodpecker is by far the most widespread of these.  Now throughout the winter months you'll hear their kick calls in the woodlands  and here you will hear a recording of that call. This one comes from Kula Tresk in Värmland, Sweden.

Enjoy. 

A second recording now from Kula Tresk in Värmland and this time it involves a displaying male coal tit.  This was recorded at the end of winter, towards the end of February.  On the day, the woodlands were just alive with the sounds of resident species. And I found this cold hit in full song, beside a remote lake in the forest.

Have a listen to this folks. 

Now, I just want a recording to go in this winter sound magazine, and this is a favorite bit of audio of mine.  It features a small flock of feeding European goldfinch, and if you listen carefully to the audio through headphones, you will hear the subtle sounds of snow falling through the canopy as the birds feed in the treetops,  and all the time, they're quietly calling to each other. 

Then you have the sound of the flock suddenly taken to the wing and that's captured brilliantly by the Tlingit parabola.  For me, getting such atmospheric recordings make it worthwhile getting out during the winter. And I'll simply play the audio for now. So this is European Gullfinch feeding the treetops at Sandamar Reserve in Sweden, just a few weeks ago. 

So there you go folks, that represents the first ever Sound Magazine broadcast on Wild Bird Acoustics.  These magazines will be a very regular feature in the podcast and they will cover a wide variety of themes and seasons and I really hope you guys will enjoy them.  Whilst the podcast is quite niche in topic, my hope is that its reach may extend beyond those interested in birdwatching and field recording and maybe find an audience that enjoys the audio from a well being or mental health aspect.

In short, I hope the audio played on the podcast can be used as a vehicle for relaxation as well as education.  So I hope you've enjoyed this small sound magazine and I hope also that it might even inspire a few of you just to get out into the field and try field recording for yourselves. It's quite a wonderful experience. 

 Now welcome everybody to the very first episode of Wild Bird Acoustics, a podcast about recording and field recording birds in their natural environment.  I've been working quite hard over the last few years just putting together some lovely sound magazines of the wonderful sounds of birds here in Sweden and going forward you can expect a lot more of these sound magazines from various reserves and areas in Sweden and hopefully you will enjoy these very much.

I'll just give you a little bit of background on myself. My name is Alan Dalton  I was, , born in Ireland and moved to Sweden in the year 2000. I've been interested in birds since I was a young boy and I've spent my whole life birding really but I only actually got into sound recording in 2012 when I bought a Talinga Parabola I'm pretty much since then, I've been out in the field doing quite a bit of sound recording, but particularly in the last five years since the pandemic.

And over the last three to four years, I've been very intensively field recording here in Sweden and have amassed quite a bit of nice audio, and that will form the bulk of the material that I will be putting the podcast together from. 

What I'd like to do now is just give you a quick outline of what you can expect going forward. So the podcast is going to be quite varied in its content and you will hear a lot of sound magazines like the one you've just heard but also other sections including one called in the field  so the commentary will be recorded in the field whilst I'm out there recording the birds  As well as in the field sections, I will also have a regular section called Knock Mig Corner and this will relate to the study of nocturnal migration.

 So at the moment, I have two listening stations here in Sweden, one on Landsort, which is an island just south of Stockholm and another further north in Sweden in Västerbotten on a tiny island called Hallegärn. And that's a place you're going to be hearing a lot of audio from. It's a wonderful, wonderful place.

It's extremely quiet, very, very remote, and the bird life there is absolutely fantastic.  Now, both areas are excellent for nocturnal migration, but also visible migration. So that's diurnally migrating birds. And again, I have a stack of audio to share with you from both of these locations of visibly migrating birds.

And it's not just migrating birds from these sites. I also have some wonderful audio of the various species that breed there in spring and summer and through the autumn as well. And I'll be sharing all of that audio with you going forward. 

In addition to my own audio, I'll also be interviewing various field recorders from around Europe and further beyond. And I'm really looking forward to these discussions already. So we'll be talking to various people from all over the world about their field recording exploits, playing some wonderful audio, discussing the kind of gear they use, how they go about their field recording, and what field recording actually means to them. 

Now it's probably wise not to explain too much going forward and we'll just see where the podcast goes of its own accord and how it actually might evolve.  I'm planning to release two episodes a month so it will release on the first and sixteenth of every month going forward for the next twelve months or so. 

So I've never done anything like this before. It's my first podcast so I hope you'll bear with me in these early episodes as I try and get my head around editing and that kind of thing.

But hopefully going forward, and one of my main hopes for the podcast is to draw together a community of field recorders and listeners.  Now, if you enjoy the podcast, please don't be afraid to leave a review or make a few suggestions on what you'd like to hear. 

You can leave a review on the host site at buzzsprout or you can apply to our mailing list at wildbirdacoustics at gmail. com 

 So there you go, folks. That's a brief synopsis of what you can expect going forward. But for now, I'd like to get back to the main topic of this episode, which is winter recording. Now here in Sweden, it can be a wonderful time to get out and do a bit of recording, despite the fact that an awful lot of species leave in the winter.

What I'll do now folks is play you our first ever in the field section and here you will sit in on a day recording at Norra Järvefeltet which is located just north of Stockholm city.

Norra Jarva Fältet is a large kind of semi agricultural, semi woodland area and it's run by Stockholm Kommune and they employ only traditional agricultural methods here and it's run as a reserve. It's a fantastic place for birds and one I really enjoy getting out into the field in and doing a bit of recording.

It's quite close to the city so it's ideal for getting out for just a few hours in the morning. So, once again, without further ado, this is a winter field recording at Norra Jarva Fältet in Stockholm. I hope you enjoy this, folks.  

  So, it's just after dawn, and  I'm out in the field in Norrs Järvafältet, and it's a very good area.  So I'm just trying to get into position to record a displaying male green woodpecker, which I've picked up,  and I'll see how that goes, and play the recording for you if I get it. 

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Now, this area is just located north of Stockholm, it's in Eksledare for birds, and I'm in the woods now. I'm getting fairly close to a singing nuthatch.  The bird's been displaying for a few minutes and it's just stopped, but it's, it seems to be stopping and starting again, so hopefully we'll stop here and just get a recording of Eurasian Nuthatch  in display. 

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Now this area is actually managed as a agricultural park, traditional methods.  It's quite nice, you have lots of woodland, lots of traditional farmland, stubble, ploughed fields, that kind of thing. And it's very, very good for birds.  There's a few raven in the area, at least. three birds that I can see and one of the males, I think it's a male, is actually displaying.

It seems to be just calling from treetops in the area and I think it's actually displaying on territory. So I'm going to try and record it now for you. 

So I actually got two nice recordings of Northern Raven there.  One of them in particular is quite nice, which is great. And while that was going on, also, there was a Eurasian Jay in the area. And I pointed the parabola at that too. And on a couple of occasions it was mimicking  Common Buzzard.  And I come across this quite a lot with this species.

They seem to mimic Common Buzzard an awful lot. And that bird is definitely doing it again.  It's always nice to record Eurasian Jay, so I was happy to get that recording as well. 

So I haven't had any Black Woodpecker action now in quite a while. Gonna start moving south  and see if I can just get lucky and bump into one. There's a single Green Finch now in the area.  But um, like I say, I'm just going to move to the woods. It's not looking too good for Black Woodpecker. Once again, they're one step ahead of me.

And, it's incredibly frustrating. It's the species I've really been after this year. And, so far, no joy. But that's the sound recording. And, on the plus side, I've got some nice recordings today. Definitely got a nice recording of Green Woodpecker. And Northern Raven, which you will have already heard by now.

So  That's the way it goes when you're out sound recording and  although you may have a target species in mind, quite often you'll just bump into other species and just slowly build up a nice catalogue of recordings in that way and that's the way to do it really. Just get out into the field, see what you bump into, record it  and just keep going. 

So the weather's quite nice now, at least the sun is out and it's quite a pleasant morning. It's about half eleven now in the morning so I've been out now for about five hours.  And we'll see what else the day has to bring. 

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I just came across some house burrow.  And, I made myself stop and record them.  And the reason for that was, I actually looked through my recordings over the winter, and realised I only had two recordings of House Barrow. And that ties into  The commoner the species is, the more likely I am to pass it over the years.

And  this year I just hope to get more recordings of the very common species that I'm missing.  I have recordings of most of them, but again, not a lot.  So species like blue tit, grey tit, starling, all that kind of stuff.  It was nice to get these two house sparrows and they were just sitting on a couple of nest boxes under the ves at a small farm yard singing and displaying away,  and they're quite close and they got a nice recording.

So  once again,  don't pass common words.  So this is a recording of House Sparrow. 

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Now I'm just walking along by the lake and there's a bit of activity here.  I can hear Siskin and Tree Creeper, Blue Tit.  I might just stop here and see what recordings I can get. 

So, at the last site there, I had a lovely mail. Eurasian Siskin, full song. Got, I think, a decent recording. Even though there's a road quite close. Maybe a little bit of noise, but it's still usable.  The day is coming to an end now. It's 1. 30 in the afternoon. It's a Sunday.  A lot of walkers around and dogs and getting closer to the road. 

So I think that's about it.  So I hope you've enjoyed this film magazine and it gives you an idea of what it's like to get out into the field and do a bit of recording.  So that's it for now on  In The Field and we'll see you next time. 

 So that brings us to the end of another episode of Wild Bird Acoustics, and I hope you've enjoyed it. As always, you can find us on YouTube by simply searching for Wild Bird Acoustics. We do have a mailing list also, and if you want to be part of that folks, you can drop us an email at wildbirdacoustics  at gmail.

com Don't be afraid to drop us a like write a review or even become a patron of the podcast and you can do that by clicking On the patreon button in the show header at buzzsprout. So I'd like to thank all of our listeners for tuning in We'll be back in a couple of weeks with more from wild bird acoustics until then Take it easy folks And as always don't be afraid to get out into the field and relax and just listen to the wildlife out there Maybe even do a little bit of field recording of your own. 

We'll talk to you soon folks. Take it easy That's all from wild bird acoustics