The Hällögern Diaries; The Best of 2024

 Over the course of 2024, I spent several weeks at coastal Västerbotten, field recording birds on the tiny island of Hällögern. During the summer months, this was often a rather relaxed affair and I frequently left microphones in the field for long periods. often in areas where I knew certain species frequented. As the island is wonderfully quiet in the summer at night, long soundscapes were often my focus, but within these long recordings there were many wonderful moments. I wanted to share some of that audio in this episode.

   At this same location, as summer moves into autumn, many migrant bird species begin to funnel southwards along the Swedish coastline. This stream of migration is something that I am always drawn towards and there is nothing better for me than standing out at  a coastal site in fall as the sun rises. Birds begin to move overhead from first light and soon after dawn, on a good morning, the skies are filled with the contact calls of many migratory species as they move overhead. There are many locations to witness this spectacle, but the far north holds a special place in my heart to witness this. Along the coast of Västerbotten, the silence is only broken by the sounds of migrant birds, making it the perfect site for the field recorder to monitor and record migrant birds. In this main sound magazine, I share some wonderful audio highlights from 2024 from my favourite part of Sweden. Think of it as an audio diary of sorts...

I will wind down with a relaxing soundscape from the same part of the world, recorded earlier in the year, at a time when the sun barely drops below the horizon. Recording under the midnight sun is the best time to record the incredibly peaceful sounds of Arctic Terns, as they forage in still conditions.

Transcript

 You are all very welcome to Wild Bird Acoustics. I'm your host, Alan Dalton, and I'll be taking you on a journey into sound.

Now welcome everybody to Wild Bird Acoustics. It's season two, episode 17, and we're drawn towards the end of the season and it's been quite incredible. I'd like to thank the listeners once again for listening, 

and what I wanted to do is just concentrate on the Autumn period. Just coming into it. It's just an incredible period to be out sound recording. And I know a lot of borders get very excited coming into the autumn, and absolutely why not? It's just the best time of the year to be out into the field.

There's so many sounds out there, and my favorite place to be is a vast button At that time of the year, it's just an incredible place to record.  So what we're gonna do is quite simply just give you a couple of sound magazines. The first one concerns Knock Make, recording, and this is recorded over the early autumn period in 2024.

And quite wonderful audio here. I'll just play that for you first. Enjoy this folks.

 Welcome everybody to another Cell magazine here at Wild Bird Acoustics. And in this cell magazine, I'm going to be running through knock make recordings from the island of Halligan in Faster button over the course of the Autumn 2024. So basically what I'm gonna do is run through these in no particular order, not date sequenced or anything, but some of the more interesting recordings from the island over the course of the autumn.

Now, the first recording I have for you is Green Sandpiper. Quite an interesting recording. It starts with the high call of the species, which is something you don't hear too often. So at the beginning of the recording, you would hear the high call, two calls of green Sandpiper, followed by the more typical call of the species given on nocturnal migration.

Have a listen.

Now next up is very common species around most parts of Europe, but natural fact at Halle Garn, it's quite scarce. The species is gray. Heron and I have a lovely recording. Quite explosive. The bird is very close to the recorder, some mallard and some Canada goose and things in the background, like I mentioned, it's quite scarce so far north, so a decent record at Halligan.

This is Gray Heron's nocturnal migration call.

Now, the next species I have for you is very sought after by nocturnal borders, and it's Lapland bunting, sometimes known as Lapland Longs Spur. Now this first recording, there's a background of passing Hooper swan, which provides a lovely backdrop, but listen here for the rattle call first of the species, followed by the more commonly given chew calls of the species and or several of those here in this recording.

This is Lapland Bunting.

Now that recording came on the 26th of August, 2024. I have another recording now for you of Lapland Bunting. This one was picked up about a week later, and that's pretty typical of these species, late August, early September. It's an excellent site for the species to pick up several every year, but like I say, it's obvious a fantastic species to get on nocturnal migration.

In this recording, you're gonna hear the usual descending chew calls of the species yet again. But this recording is notable. As there's another call type in here that I'd never actually picked up before at night, and it's a little bit more variable. It's quite hard to describe, but it's clearly audible in this recording.

So here's Lapland punting once again, typical chew calls of the species, and another call type, which I had not picked up before.

Next up is Song Thrush. Very much a regular species, but not terribly common on the island in comparison to my other listening station at Hort. But a very nice recording here from early September of song Thrush, passing over the recorder, the high calls of these species, like I say, very much a bread and butter species for the nocturnal recorder.

But I'll play a nice recording of the species. Now this is song for a.

Now many species start to move much earlier this far north, and one of those is spotted fly catcher. I get these from the second week of August onwards. I'm gonna play a few recordings of these species. Now they're usually very, very short, single or double calls as the birds go over, and this first call is a spotted fly catcher from the 24th of August, 2024.

Like I say, very short recording. Have a listen.

Now regarding spotted fly catcher and the very similar sounding pipe fly catcher, I got a little bit flippant with these species and began to think I could easily tell apart by ear. But I actually reviewed my recordings in 2024 and found I'd made several mistakes, and as a result, I've reverted back to checking these species carefully by sonogram, just to rule out any mistakes of the species.

Now, quite often they get a lot of birds in halligan, mostly Spotify catcher with just a handful of pie fly catcher. But I'm gonna play you another spotted fly catcher recording. Now, this time in early September.

Another brief recording now, also of spotted fly catcher, and why not? This was recorded on the 6th of September, 2024.

Next up I have a recording of two species. A very regular species on the island is tree pivot. Also listen here for the calls, a contact call of rambling, in fact, and then the more typical nasal call, but the main species here, the louder calls are the buzzing nocturnal calls of tree pit.

The next recording I have for you is a brace of whiter species. One is wood sandpiper, and another is one my favorite species. Two. Listen to, and that is a Wim Brill. Quite a nice recording, quite scarce here in Sweden. You don't get a large amount of birds going over at night, especially at this location, so I was quite happy with this one, despite the fact there's a bit of a dog bark here in the background.

There's also some background here of Hooper Swan in the distance, but listen carefully for the calls of Wimble going over in the night as well as the calls of wood Sandpiper. A very typical species at night on the island. This is from the 18th of August, 2024.

Now while we're here covering windmill, I have a shorter recording of the same species. A nice close recording. Have a listen. Once again. This is Wim Brill passing over at Haller in early September, 2024.

Now, next up, one of these specialties on the island and that is rustic punting. It's a very subtle species, rust stick bunting, and I generally separate these on sonogram, but they do have a certain quality to them, to the ear, just a bit more of a tongue clicking quality to them, and I'm starting to get used to these by ear now folks.

And the main species to separate them from of course, is song thrush. We'll have a listen to the recording now. This is Rustic Bunting in early September, 2024 at Haller.

Now, I'll tell you one more of Rustic Bunting. This one came on the 3rd of September, 2024. There's a little bit of distant car noise in the background, but it doesn't really take away from the recording too much I have found with Rustic Bunting. Generally speaking, they call quite metronomic on a regular spaced interval.

Quite unlike Song thrush. Sometimes they give one or two, maybe three calls, but Rustic Bunting quite often as they pass, will give several calls, so you're gonna hear two or three calls from this bird. Now, the sonogram of this species is typically an uneven V-shape. With one leg shorter than the other.

They're also significantly lower in kilohertz, a lower pitch than song thrush and, but a bit of practice. They're quite easy to separate. I find also it helps that rustic bonding go through in the last two weeks of August and first week or 2nd of September. There is a bit of overlap in September at this site, which generally speaking, a lot of rustic bunting go through earlier than song thrush.

I played the recording now. This is Rustic Bunting once again at Haller.

Now knock mid can be quite difficult and even after several years, I still struggle with a lot of calls. I have a lot of mystery calls that I still haven't solved, and quite often species give a burdens type calls. I'm gonna play one now. One of the most striking species for me giving a burden calls is Red Wing.

They can give you a bit of a headache, so I'll go and play a quick, a burdens call of a red wing. Not the typical call of these species, but certainly Red Wing. Have a listen.

Now next up is a species that gave me the greatest difficulty for the longest time. It's Erland Lan Bunting. And in this recording, you're going to hear an Erland bunting moving over during a passage of Robin. On the 28th of August, 2024, listen carefully for the descending two calls of the species. This is very, very subtle.

Folks. You will hear calls from Orland on 13 seconds and 42 seconds. Among migrating Robin. Robin actually start moving very early this far north and by late August they're on the move. As you will hear in this recording, several Robin calls and as I say, Orland at 13 seconds. And 42 seconds.

I will play another recording of Lon this time. A single call here is the only call in the recording and it's very, very subtle. Again, it's a difficult species at night and one that gave me a major headache for several years. Quite often there's yellow, white tails passing at night. Just the odd bird.

Sometimes if you've got a distant bird, it can be very, very difficult to separate from Orland and probably just left it on. But over the last couple of years, I've got the grips with the species. This is another recording of Orland at Halle.

Now one last recording of Artland Bunting again demonstrating how subtle they can be. And this was on the 28th of August, 2024. The bird passed amongst passing three pivot. There's also a single robin call here towards the end, but listen carefully for the calls of Artland Bunting at 13 seconds and 22 seconds.

As I say, folks, very, very subtle.

Now the next species is an extreme rarity quite far north in Vata Botten. I've got several records now. It is Taal, and it may come as a little bit of a surprise that the species could be so rare, but it is quite far north in Sweden. And it generally doesn't venture this far north, but in the last few years, birds have started to appear in VA button and it's certainly becoming more regular.

I'm going to play you a couple of recordings here back to back. They were recorded on the seventh and 8th of September, 2024 at Hadger and VA button. This is Tony, a very good local record. Have a listen.

So there you go. That's the first recording, and I'll quickly play you the second from the next night.

Now I'm a big fan of waiters. I love their calls. But one of my favorite species is spotted red shank. I'm going to play a lovely recording now of a spotted red shank from the 4th of August, 2024, a bird passing over the island just after midnight. Quite a nice, clear recording. You can hear it approaching from the distance.

Just a little bit of echo as the bird calls in the distance and eventually goes right over the recorder. This is spotted Reding.

Now I'm a big fan of the species and got to play another recording from the 28th of July. These birds pass from late July, and it's a fantastic call. In the background here you're gonna hear routing woodcock just for good measure. This is spotted red shank at Hallinger once again.

Now I have one last recording for you. It's my favorite species on the island. It is a species that passes in good numbers through the autumn. It depends on the year. I have actually discovered a pattern which fits in with the pattern of routed numbers. The species I'm talking about is Tang, mazel or Boreal, and there's little more to come about this in episode 19 of the podcast later in the season.

This species is just synonymous with the island. For me, t Mazel is a fantastic species. I'm gonna play you a typical recording of a bird passing down the coast in autumn. It's from the 17th of September, 2024. This is Tang Mazel an absolutely wonderful noise. How about listen to this.

So there you go, everybody. That's just a roundup of the early Autumn audio I have for you from Halligan. I was on the island until I think the 3rd of August, at which point I left out an SM mini audio recorder, and that recorded through until the end of September. Whenever returned to the island for a week, and at that point I replaced the batteries and the SD card and left it out again.

So in actual fact, it won't be until July, 2025 when I actually get back to the island. That'll be able to take out the SD card from that recorder and actually analyze the audio from the late autumn period of last year. And that's the way it goes. And it's amazing actually for me to actually. Realize I've just put together maybe a 25 minute sound magazine and it's probably taken me the best part of 20 hours to analyze this audio.

Quite often you don't get a great deal of high quality audio at night. You, you can definitely go through the audio and record most species to pass over, so it's very, very useful for recording the numbers of migrants going over. But putting a sound magazine together is a little bit different. You're looking for slightly higher quality audio.

And like I say, it's difficult to get good quality audio. You need the species to pass very, very close to the recorder. They don't always do that. So basically you have seven weeks, eight weeks of audio here and it has boiled down basically to about 25 minutes. But having said that, I get some fantastic data from the island.

It's well worth the efforts. And if I only end up with a small number of good recordings, that's fine as well. I just kind of store them away, and over the course of several years, you build up quite a nice library of recordings. So I hope you have enjoyed the highlights of the early part of the autumn in 2024.

That's knock Make recording at Halle Garn, and I hope you guys have enjoyed this Short Sale Magazine once again here at Wild Bird Acoustics. As always, folks, thanks for listening.

So there you go folks. That's a Short sound magazine and that is for all you neg enthusiasts out there. I notice quite a lot of the listeners who are very, very involved in Knock Make. So I do hope you enjoyed that sound magazine. 

 Now I'm gonna continue with the autumn theme. I spent a week up on the island of Hogar in September, 2024. It was quite wonderful. The weather wasn't perfect, not by a long way. It was very windy on several days, but at the same time, I was up there for the first time in autumn with my se Heiser array, and I got a wide range of incredible audio.

Some of this is. Just species on the island moving through the oil, and some are resident species. It's a. A Labor. I love the Sound magazine. I hope you do enjoy it. It's a place I absolutely love to be. It's incredibly quiet. It's a sound record's dream, and there's so many nice soundscapes here.

I hope it gives you an impression of what's like to be up in northern Sweden in the middle of nowhere, in autumn as birds are passing through. Without any further ado, I'll just get onto the sound magazine and I hope you enjoy it.

 Now you're all very welcome to another sound magazine here at Wild Bird Acoustics and in this sound magazine, we're gonna be taking you back up to Halligan in northern Sweden and we're gonna be concentrating on autumn migration and some of the sounds that you hear on the island typically. Now, once again, as I always do, I visit the island September, 2024.

I was up there for about nine days and I had a wonderful time boarding. Now weather conditions weren't ideal for sound recording over the course of much of the nine days, but I still got some lovely sound recordings. Was was there, and we're gonna share some of these with you today. Now I'm gonna start off with a lovely little soundscape from early in the morning on 27th of September, 2024.

There's quite a lot going on in this recording. It's about two minutes 40 seconds long and you will hear the usual tits blue tits. Great tits. Well, this note also for migrating Reed Bunting, the nasal call and the typical chew call. There's also Northern Bull Engine here, plenty of Red Wing giving various calls.

There's Mallard Meadow PPA over flying some quiet calls of song thrush in the Woodland, as well as hooded crow. Have a listen.

Song Thrush is a regular species at Halle Garn in the autumn. And in this recording, you're going to hear a song Thrush giving alarm calls. Now the alarm calls the song Thrush sound a little bit like Blackbird, but I got a nice recording on this occasion. And there's a little bit of road noise in the distance here.

But also in the background you're going to hear calling Goldcrest a few blue tit a single call of Willow tit. And towards the end, Eurasian Siskin. But the main subject here is an alarming song, thrush in the Woods on the island early in the morning of the 24th of September, and it makes for quite a nice recording.

Now one of the most prevalent species on the island in late September as a migrant is Reed Bunting, and there were a lot of birds as usual in 2024. I have a recording here for you of several migrating Reed Buntings overlying the island early in the morning. Now in the background here, you're gonna hear Meadow Pipi Common Red Paul.

Calling Goldcrest and there's a lovely little ambiance through the trees here. There's a bit of wind just moving through the pine trees and I think it adds quite nicely to the recording. So once again, this is recorded with the Sennheiser Array and it's a very nice recording of migrating. Greet one things early in the morning.

Now I am gonna stay on Reid Bunting. Have a little short recording for you here. And on this occasion it was Reid Bunting that landed close to my position whilst I was watching Vis mig. The bird just giving some calls from some ler, and once again, there's some lovely ambience from the wind just moving through the LER leaves here.

Now a slightly longer recording and a typical early morning scene here from the island on the 28th of September, 2024. The main species you will hear here is raven. That was a pair just flying around the area, giving various calls. There's a lot of migration going on as well. In the background. Have a listen for hooded crow, then siskin some nice calls of bling.

Just overlying my position on the north of the island. Some calling gold crest in the background. As always, there's meadow pivot flying over on migration. A few calls, a chaffing, some common red Paul in the distance and as always, early in the morning. Just feel for moving through, just giving some checking calls from the nearby pine trees.

Now a species that's always quite exciting on Haller is part of cross pill, and late September is an excellent time for species on migration at this site. Now I have a lovely recording for you here of a flock just passing off from my position. There nice calls in the background here too. You're gonna hear Ling Meadow pivot and hooded Crow, and once again, you have that lovely ambiance of wind through the other leaves close to my position.

So we'll listen to that now. This is a particularly nice recording of Paris Cross Bill on passage at Haller in Sweden.

Wow.

Now I'm gonna stay on Parrot Cross Bill for a moment. I haven a shorter recording here for you and birds passing again at the north of the island on the morning of the 26th of September, and you can hear quite an interesting variation on call in this little recording. So this is par of Cross Bill once again.

So I think we'll take another recording of Par Cross Bill whilst we're at it. And this one was actually recorded with the Tinga parabola. Now this is recorded a little bit later in the morning at about 11:00 AM as the birds passed over the woods at the back of the cabin. So you can hear the blue tits and gray tits.

The local tiff locks just doing their thing in the woodland as a flock of parrot. Crossbill, overly the island.

Now, generally speaking, later in the morning and in the afternoon on the island, it's pretty quiet. Quite often the birds have passed over on migration. And things can go pretty quiet, but generally speaking, in the woods, there are always a lot of birds, and I decided to grab a little soundscape with the Tinga Pbla on the afternoon of the 25th of September.

Now, recording in the middle of the day, actually in September, 2024 was a little bit difficult. There was some road work going on in the distance, and the sound carried quite a long way, but I was able to avoid this to a degree with the Tinga, and it's not too invasive here. So in this recording, you're gonna hear a soundscape of the woodlands behind the cabin, and you're gonna hear field fair blue tit willow, tits robin, just moving around and calling Ray tit the calls of coal tit, red wing, sun thrush, and towards the end, the calls of Northern Bull.

This is quite a nice soundscape. I'll give you about three minutes of this.

Now next I have a lovely recording taken with the Sennheiser array and the recording is of Northern Bull Inch just moving around the woods calling. It's a beautiful call, just a trumpeting kind of sound, and it's very, very typical of the island in late autumn. It's certainly one of the sounds of faster button.

Now in the background here, you're gonna hear various tits just moving around the island, feeding and calling, and also hear a lot of goldcrest action. This is quite a nice recording. Have a listen folks.

Now we have some calls from a migrant species. Next. It's a grounded migrant, in fact, and it is common ch jaff. Now here in Sweden, the regular call from CH chaff in autumn is a WEO type call. It's quite different to what you hear quite often in Ireland, and I remember hearing these birds in the so West of Ireland sometimes.

When I was burning there as a young man, and I was quite confused by the range of calls that the species often gave in passage in Ireland, but it seems here in Northern Europe, this is the regular call of chief Jeff. So once again, this is a very nice recording. There's some weed bumping in the background, as always overflowing the area.

It's a few chaffing, but the main subject here is Chief chuff. This was recorded on the 24th of September, 2024. It was recorded with the Sennheiser array, and once again, there's a lovely little bit of ambience with the wind just moving through all the kind of foliage in the elder cups at the north end of the islands have listed this folks, I.

As I have already mentioned, it was quite windy in September, 2024, but rather than shy away from this, I wanted to try and get some soundscapes of the wind moving through the island. So what I'm gonna play for you now is a small bit, an excerpt of a much longer soundscape. Which I took on the 22nd of September, 2024, was a very windy day and the wind was just piling through the Douglas Fair tops on the island, and it just made for a lovely ambience.

In the background here, you're gonna hear the calls of the local tit flocks moving around the island, as well as some autum thrushes, and they're just competing at times. They're actually drowned out by the sound of the wind. So I'll play a short bit of that soundscape now. This is the wind moving through the island on that particular afternoon, and it makes for a lovely, relaxing soundscape.

Now next up is a very common species. It is song thrush. And what you're gonna hear now is a recording of sub song from song thrush. And I just took the Sennheiser out into the woods one day and I got lucky with this. So it's quite interesting. Really. In the spring, a adult song thrush will sit in the woods and give a kind of perfectly formed well practice song.

But quite often in the autumn, birds on passage will sit in the woods and give what is known as sub song. Quite often these are young birds, but adult birds do it as well. Now, as I say, I was quite looking this occasion. I just got the S Heiser quite close to the bird and it made for a very nice, clear recording.

So once again, this is a lovely clear recording of the sub song of song Thrush recorded at FASTA button in September, 2024. Also, here in the background, you're gonna hear some nice calls of Goldcrest. Let's have a listen to that.

Next up, another very, very common species on the island and also elsewhere around Europe. Common chaffing. And on this occasion I had the Sennheiser out in the Woods. Woods again, and along came with Chaff inch and just started to give the regular kind of pink Gs that you hear around Europe. It's a very clear, nice recording, quite short, so I'll play that for you now.

This is Common Chaffin at Fasta Button Sweden.

Next look, we have a very interesting recording. It's of Eurasian J. It's quite an amazing mimic. And in this recording you're gonna hear you raising Jay mimicking common buzzard. Now there's a little bit of noise in the background from my neighbor's dog. LF was up for the weekend and his dog was having a bit of an episode over the course of the afternoon.

I think there was a couple of reindeer around that was bragging at them. But in the background here, you will hear nut hatch cold hit calling calls of willow tit and some ticking calls from European Robin. So the main subject here obviously was this Eurasian Jay, and it does a quite amazing job. At mimicking common buzzard.

You'll hear that here for yourself. You'll also hear some quite odd calls, kind of R 2D two type calls, which occasionally Jay give as well at a reasonably low frequency. You'll have to listen quite carefully for those. But again, main subject here is the incredible mimicry of common buzzard. This is all Eurasian.

Jay, have a listen.

Next up is a very short recording of a couple of very typical species on the island in autumn, and they are a missile thrush and meadow pivot. So both species calling here, rattle call in particular of missile thrush is one of my favorite autumn calls. Absolutely love this one. So I'll play that for you now.

This is Missile Thrush and Meadow Pivot on the 27th of September, 2024.

Now the last recording in the Sound magazine, I'm going to leave you with a nice little passage of just autumn migration. In this, you can hear the trumpeting calls of Northern both inch. Once again as well, AsCan passing over through the trees. Also here you will hear some of these single no calls from rambling.

If you listen carefully for those, some goldcrest in the woods. The calls of song thrush quietly ringing out in the woods in the morning, as well as local tit flux and a single hooded crow calling in the morning.

So there you go folks. That's a selection hub. Ferus Audio from Hall Garn in the autumn of 2024. It's a wonderful place to record. If I'm honest, actually, in 2024, the migration wasn't fantastic. The weather conditions weren't ideal. I rarely got like a southwesterly wind, which is really what you want to read in the westerly or a southeasterly.

And quite often the winds were very, very strong from a northwesterly or northeast direction, which certainly isn't ideal for migration. But when it did die down a little bit, there was still plenty to see. And towards the end of the stay the last two mornings, I did have a couple mornings of good migration.

Each autumn is different on the island, it depends on the weather, very, very much. You just never know what you're gonna get, and it's been quite wonderful over the years to get up there and do a bit of sound recording in such a quiet environments. That's all for the Sound magazine. My name is Alan Dalton.

I'd like to thank you all for joining us once again here at Wild Bird Acoustics. 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 Wild Bird acoustics@gmail.com.

Now all feedback is greatly received here at the podcast. And if you'd like to write review of the podcast, you can do so at the buzzsprout header page. In addition, if you'd like to make a small financial donation to the podcast, you can do so using the buy me a Coffee button, and you'll find that also on the Buzzsprout header page.

We will 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.