This is a couple of minutes of the morning bird songs at my house… I’m not sure, but I think the Song Sparrow is the loudest songbird here.
Picture from Cornell’s All About Birds website.
This is the first in a series of doorbell recordings. This is a Model RC369-4 from the Artolier Lighting & Sound Division of Emerson Electric Company. This one is my home.
The first recording is a single push & the second is a double (the Mailman always rings twice).
I built a pair of mini omni mics using a pair of Primo BT-EM158 capsules from Frogloggers.com that fit into a pair of 1/8″ stereo jacks. I then took a pair of clip-on flashlights, took out the innards and knocked out the divider between the batteries & the switch. I had to add a couple of layers of black tape to the jack housing to make the mics stay put & leave enough room for the foam windshields.
Then I put together a mini Jecklin disk with a 7″ embroidery hoop, a piece of corfam, and some auto headliner foam for the baffle. I then screwed the base of the clip-on flashlight to the disc to hold the mics.
This will make a very compact rig that I can carry in my regular bag.
I tested it with a Sony MZ-R30 MiniDisc recorder on my back porch… You should hear Pine Siskins, House Finches, Chickadees, Red Breasted Nuthaches, California Quail, and a couple of birds I couldn’t identify:
One thing I don’t like about winter is the fact that I can’t keep my windows open so I can listen to the birds at our feeders. So I rigged up an old Sony parabolic dish with one of the AT-ES947 boundary mics I have. I ran the mic into an extra Rolls MX34 mixer & out to a Roland MiniCube amp, which is sitting on our dining room sideboard. It almost makes it feel like spring!
The Special Olympics Flame came to Boise today… For some reason the committee decided to hire one of our local “radio personalities” to emcee. Good choice(?)