cross-posted from: https://beehaw.org/post/548613

I always take a walk around my office during lunch. Finally managed to see and also record a firecrest. Such a tiny but cool-looking bird!

  • @[email protected]English
    10•2 years ago

    So cool! I always enjoy seeing birds from other parts of the world than I frequent.

    If I may add, politely, that you should be careful not to lean too heavily on the sound ID of merlin for accuracy. It’s good, but not great by any means.

    We need a Birding community here!!

    • @[email protected]OPEnglish
      9•2 years ago

      I made [email protected] if you’re interested :-)

      And you’re right about Merlin! I never fully trust it either, but in this case I just used it to confirm that the call I heard was, indeed, a firecrest. I don’t hear them too often so I wasn’t sure. I ended up seeing it as well.

      But I’ve had Merlin misidentify things before. It heard part of a Song Thrushes singing and thought it was an oystercatcher 😬

      Edit: wrong link

    • @cfiEnglish
      2•2 years ago

      I usually use it a starting point and then go into the details page and listen to the reference calls to see if its the right bird. If I can see the bird, its pretty easy to tell if its right or not.

      That said, I’ve only had Merlin misidentify a bird once. However there are a lot of times where it fails to identify a bird, even if the recording is crystal clear.