[Claudia Gary]

Bird songs have played a role in a few poems on the Met board recently, including my "Aubade." In that discussion, one member posted what I found to be a worthwhile link:
http://songbirdscience.com/resources...tlab-functions

Today an article from The Guardian came to my attention, about the importance of bird songs to the history of music. This is not a new discovery, but it is timely for certain reasons:
https://www.theguardian.com/music/mu...vital-to-music

Some of us may find bird songs more of a delight and comfort than we realize.

#

[John Isbell]

They sell clocks where each hour is marked by a different bird's song. I was going to get one for a blind student of mine, so that she could enjoy knowing twelve local birds by their song when she heard them. I never did, which i somewhat regret.

John

[Ann Drysdale]

Today, fortuitously, began here in the UK with an all-night programme celebrating the dawn chorus. There was poetry and music galore; it might have been made for Claudia. Let me see if I can link to it...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b08pdfyw

[Orwn Acra]

My roommate has an old record from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology that I love to listen to. It's supposed to accompany the Peterson Field Guide to Birds of North America, but we don't have that book, so there is something anti-anti-mimetic about hearing a narrator tell me the name of the bird, the page on which it appears, and then a recording of the bird to match its illustration in a book that does not exist for me.

[Claudia Gary]

John, I think my neighbor has one of those clocks. It alarmed me once when I was visiting, but the calls seemed realistic. Back when I used to visit Missouri, I found plush toy birds at Bass Pro containing real birdsong recordings that play when you squeeze the toy. My grandkids still love them.

Ann, that's amazing! Thank you for posting the link. The program certainly is long enough to last all night, so I just skipped around and listened to parts of it. The bird songs and choruses are beautiful, but I kind of wish the guys would be quiet more of the time.
Does the BBC broadcast something like this periodically, or was this one unique?

Orwn, that's hilarious. I hope at least 50% of that record consists of bird calls.

Thanks, all.

Claudia

[Jennifer Reeser]

What a well-written, fascinating, and even-poetic piece. Claudia, thanks so much for posting this! They are one of my greatest pleasures in life, the birds are.

I had one of those clocks, too, which Mr. Isbell mentions. As I recall, I got it as a "thank-you" gift for my contribution to a Bird Sanctuary Conservancy group.

I smiled, at the mention of "domestic cats," among the threats to their existence

Jennifer