I'm finally getting around to buying a CD of western bird songs, and can't
decide between the two Peterson CD collections: Western Bird Songs (or
something like that) and Birding by Ear, western edition. The former
claimed to have an absurd 522 species on just two CDs (or does the 522
include the eastern edition?). The latter offers what seems to me to be an
absurdly low 90 species on three CDs.

It seems obvious that the Bird Songs CD is far more comprehensive, and the
Birding by Ear far more thorough. Does anybody out there have opinions on
either, or ideally both? Has anyone been frustrated by the low species
count on the Birding by Ear? By the fewer vocalizations on the Bird Songs?

I have the Stokes eastern bird CD collection. Is it possible that the
Birding by Ear CD features only western-only birds, in which case it might
be an ideal companion to the Stokes? If it's something like the 90 most
common songbirds, 65 or 70 of which are on the Stokes, it might be less than
an ideal solution...

Jim McCoy
jfmccoy at earthlink.net
Redmond, WA