Thanks. I bought Stokes last weekend and have Peterson's on order. I'm
creating my own CD's with subsets of the birds on the Stoke's CD's. For
example, I'll create a CD with just the shorebirds that are likely to be
found in WA and I'll bring that on my birding trips.

I appreciate your advice.



-----Original Message-----
From: Douglas Canning [mailto:dcanning at nisquallyestuary.org]
Sent: Sunday, May 05, 2002 11:59 AM
To: tweeters
Subject: Re: Seeking Suggestions for Bird Call CD's

On 2 May 2002, Mason Flint wrote:

> I'd appreciate any suggestions. North American birds...

Buy them all! And I'm not being flippant -- they're all a bit
different in that they use different song and call dialects from
different times of the year. I use both Peterson's and Stokes' for
over-all North American coverage where the birds are organized
phylogenetically. Peterson's has the advantage of a partial ponetic
index to bird song. Stokes' has the advantage of complete notes on
sex, subspecies, time of year, and location for the songs and calls.

To learn *how* to listen to bird song, I've found it more useful to
use the Birding by Ear CD sets where the birds are arranged by
similar sounds.

Then there are some really neat Pacific Northwest compilations such
as Bird Songs of the Pacific States (Cornell Lab of Ornithology) and
Birds Songs of the Okanagan where the birds are organized by habitat
type.

And finally, there are products like Thayer's Birds of North America
designed for use on a computer which make it really easy to select a
particular species, but the variety of songs/calls for a species are
rather limited, as is the sound quality unless one is using the CD on
a desktop machine with an unusually good sound card and speakers.

My bottom line recommendation: for a comprehensive North American CD
set, go with Stokes. To learn how to listen to bird song, go with the
Western Birding by Ear and play it endlessly.


*****************************
Douglas Canning
Olympia, Washington
dcanning at nisquallyestuary.org
*****************************