Hi Mark,

Martyn Stewart, a local sound recordist and owner/founder of
internationally-recognized NatureSound.org, recently co-authored
Birdsongs of the Pacific Northwest: A Field Guide And Audio Cd
(Illustrated by Stephen Whitney):
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0898868211/qid=1150606751/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/104-9328769-5899145?s=books&v=glance&n=283155.

I have posted on my website a little Flash work-in-progress that
displays many of the local species I've photographed (plus a few
non-locals), and in most cases pairs them with their calls (courtesy
of Martyn Stewart). If you like multi-sensory learning, this might be
an additional way to learn. At some point I hope to program a quiz
format into it so you can test your visual and aural recognition skills:
http://dartfrogmedia.com/birds/knowYourBirds/

Lots of these birds, of course, have multiple calls and songs, as
well as local dialects, so it becomes a rather complex pursuit. I
myself am not all that good at identifying calls. My wife often
listens to CD's of bird calls while driving, and she's a lot better
than I am at ID'ing bird sounds.

Best wishes,
Marc Hoffman
Kirkland, WA
mailto:tweeters at dartfrogmedia.com
http://www.dartfrogmedia.com/portfolio

At 05:10 PM 8/28/2006, you wrote:
>Hi All,
>
>As a fairly new bird watcher, I have decided that it is time for me
>to take time to learn some bird songs. The problem of course is which ones?
>
>I have the Stokes CDs and took the time to make a CD of the subset
>of "common" Seattle birds. This trimmed the list from ~500 to ~90.
>This list is still too long to seem like a good starting point. I'd
>like to trim things to perhaps 20-30 that I would try to memorize
>and perhaps another 30 that I would listen to occasionally for
>familiarity. It seems like the place to start is with common birds
>that sing regularly, i.e. those birds I am likely to hear. It also
>seems to make sense to focus on birds that I amlikely to hear but
>not see or be able to identify easily otherwise.
>
>So, I was hoping that you folks could give me some recommendations.
>Where do I start?
>
>Thanks, Mark
>
>Mark Wensnahan
>Ballard/Seattle
>reganw at rockislandDOTcom
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