Methods

Our procedure

1. Gather materials and equip orange vest.

2. Locate where you will be birding. Preferably outside.

3. On the data sheet, record field number, date, phone letters, time, location, temperature, humidity, sky, and wind. Record the decibels using Decibel X app and the average value that it gives you after 20 seconds.

4. Start a ten minute timer and start up the Sound ID feature on Merlin.

5. For each new bird type that you see, hear, or otherwise detect, write the bird name into the left column. Tally each bird that you see or hear onto the data sheet in the “Number of birds observed” column. If you can see the bird, put an additional tally in the behavior boxes according to what they were doing. Use binoculars and field guides if you need help identifying a bird.

6. Once the ten minutes is up, record the data in the epicollect app at the following project: https://five.epicollect.net/project/asm-su25-birds/data

7. LEAVE

8. Unequip orange vest

Variables

Main variable: noise level

Other variables: location temperature, cloud cover, wind, humidity, time of day, time of the month, vegetation levels, presence of other species (predators, prey, etc), presence of human structures, proximity of water bodies