Date: 6/13/26 3:59 pm From: william kossack <wskossack...> Subject: Re: [cobirds] How to record audio in windy conditions
I use a good shotgun microphone and a digital recorder. However, years
ago i birded with randy Little in new jersey. Randy did all the original
sound recordings for the Peterson field guides using a large parabolic dish
microphone
On Sat, Jun 13, 2026, 4:54 PM Mary Keithler <mkeithler...> wrote:
> Hi Nathan,
>
> Thanks for the timely recording tips and the heads up on the Merlin
> updates we can look forward to. Sounds very handy.
>
> Mary
>
> Sent from my iPhone
>
> On Jun 13, 2026, at 4:11 PM, Nathan Pieplow <npieplow...> wrote:
>
>
> Hi everybody,
>
> In recent days I've seen several examples of a classic Colorado birding
> problem: people try to record audio of a bird, but there's simply too much
> wind, and the recording ends up being unusable, or nearly so.
>
> If you find yourself in this situation, I recommend that you start up
> Merlin and then *put your phone in your pocket.* The fabric then acts as
> a makeshift windscreen. It usually doesn't dramatically affect the levels
> from the bird sound, but it can greatly cut down on wind noise.
>
> In a few weeks, we will all have the ability to send recordings from
> Merlin directly to eBird on our phones. This will also come with the
> ability to trim recordings in Merlin. If you do the phone-in-the-pocket
> trick, it will be important to trim away the not-in-pocket parts of the
> recording to ensure the best levels on the resulting online audio.
>
> While I'm at it, I'll exhort everyone to please *keep your recorder
> running* longer than you might be tempted to. I've been asked to identify
> a bunch of ten-second and twenty-second recordings of Warbling Vireos
> recently, and it's not always possible. *The longer your recordings, the
> better,* especially for things like Warbling Vireos or any kind of
> rarity. Longer recordings are easier to ID and can be used in a wider
> variety of scientific research.
>
> Thanks, and good birding!
>
> Nathan Pieplow
> Boulder
>
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