[birdky] Old Dog - New Tricks, hearing birds for the first Time.

Birders,

Birders that know me and have been in the field with me, know I can't hear 
most higher pitched bird calls. I have nerve deafness brought about when I 
was young and worked at running a saw in a mill. There is a whole section of 
my hearing where the nerves are dead and no amount of volume nor even getting 
close to the source allows me to hear them. It has been that way all my 
birding life and I have never heard most warbler songs and many of the other 
high pitched notes.

There is always a good side and a bad side to any handicap. My silver lining 
was that on Big Days and such I can hear low notes such as owls long before 
others as I'm not hearing the leaves rustle and insects. There are even other 
benefits such as when I can't hear a bird I have to stay back and search as 
others listen and look for other ticks on the list. In my searches I usually 
add a species or two that are not singing but I do miss some birds. Probably 
the most rewarding point is that it forces me to be more alert to details and 
movement; I became highly visually oriented to make up for the hearing loss.

Over the years, I had talked about how nice it would be if someone would come 
up with a unit that would take in high pitched sounds and drop them into my 
hearing range. Well, it has been done. I have pretty fair hearing in normal 
ranges and I've seen people with all the new digital hearing aids and I have 
kept up with most of the advances but none did just what I wanted. At $1000 
an ear it was not a mistake I could afford to make.

I recently read about a new device and ordered one. It was developed by a 
birder for birders. It does not appreciably interfere with your normal 
hearing and it has a pair of small ear phones with mikes attached on each 
piece for directional hearing. It takes in only the high tones, lowers them 
by 1/2 - 1/3 or 1/4 according to your loss, you can pick which works best in 
the field. Fortunately I can hear all the birds songs I've never been able to 
hear at the first level. It hangs on your belt and you do have a small amount 
of control for volume and you can switch it on and off as you need to or 
leave it on all the time you are in the field. You can balance the sound from 
ear to ear for directional adjustment just as you adjust the diopter on your 
field glasses for each eye. 

As many of you know I love birding the tropics because I can hear most of the 
birds down there. It seems low pitched sound travels best in that atmosphere 
and the heavy large leaves. With this device it sound like you are in the 
tropics. I was amazed at all the insects and such that I just plain do not 
hear. It was a sensory overload at first but I am getting use to it. In 
playing with it, I am finding out what to expect and I am really pleased with 
what it is doing. It is a whole new world that I've been dropped into and I 
like it.

When I got the device, I immediately put on my Peterson Tapes. I had always 
thought I was being cheated by Roger as most of my tape was blank;o) Well, to 
my surprise they are not blank, I could hear every note of every song on the 
tape. It does make some of the other calls I now know a bit harder to ID 
because some songs I thought were made up of 4 or 5 notes, I now hear as 10 
or 12 notes. It will be a long and hard task to learn all these new songs but 
with Mark, Mike and others helping I might get a few of them knocked off.  

The morning after getting the device, I walked out back and heard something 
different. A little searching found a Yellow-rumped Warbler with its head 
thrown back. My first time ever to hear one sing. On Sunday, I could hear the 
incessant whine of the Blue-gray Gnatcatchers that everyone complains about 
and even the fussing of Chickadees. I found 6 singing Grasshopper Sparrows by 
myself, no longer do I have to stand by and watch this little sparrow throw 
open its mouth, swell up and I not hear a thing. I'm sure advances will be 
made in this field quickly just like computers but I jumped on this unit and 
I am happy with the results.

Can an old dog (Coot) learn new tricks? I don't know but this old dog is 
digging and howling;o) I'm just learning all the ins and outs but will answer 
any questions for anyone or you can just go to the web page listed below. You 
can take an on line test. It sold me.

I have no monetary interest in plugging this device, other than to help 
others to a place they might not have been or return to a place they once 
enjoyed. If interested go to the following site: 

<A 
HREF="http://www.naturesound.com/songfinder/songfinder.html";>http://www.naturesound.com/songfinder/songfinder.html</A>

PS. They have another model that goes even farther in that you can hear bat 
location calls and the very highest pitched insect calls.

Good Birding!!!

Jeff R. Wilson
OL' COOT / TLBA
Bartlett Tenn.


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