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Summary: Birding by Ear, Eastern/Central, Peterson Field Guides
Review: ....This set of audio tapes was a disappointment to me. I had wanted a set of bird songs to accompany my new Peterson Eastern Birds field guide, 4th edition.( Previously, I had owned the 2nd edition and its excellent, page-coordinated, accompanying tapes and had used them for years.) I bought this new set of audio tapes blind, so to speak, because they were shrink-wrapped with no real description visible. No one in any of the retail stores I consulted knew anything about them nor was willing to break into the shrink-wrapping.
....Birding by Ear, Eastern/Central is actually a 3-tape short course in identifying bird calls. It is essentially useless for field identification. To make use of this set of tapes, one would have to sit down and listen and listen and listen to interminable commentary by a sonorous male voice introducing bird calls in clusters that are of minimal use because they are grouped by similarity, which often doesn't translate into geography or habitat. The second side of the third tape is a "review" that is actually a test.... one must listen to a series of unidentified songs and try to remember what they are, after having spent the hours required to listen to the other 5 sides of the tapes.
.... The up side of this set of tapes is that the bird song recordings are excellent. They include both the song and the call. (But they are useless in the field in this format.)
Rating: 
Summary: Excellent for the beginner/intermediate birder
Review: As someone who is interested in improving their birding skills, I found this an excellent guide. The authors begin by explaining some basic bird facts related to vocalizations. They proceed with the recordings, which are grouped into birds with similar songs (the authors refer to this as "pairing"). This improves the listners ability to correctly identify the song with the bird. The last portion of the auditory cassette places the birds into habitat groupings without the identification of the bird. This section can be used as a test of the listners abilities or to help familiarize the listner with where each bird can most probably be found. This in turn helps the reader correctly identify birds in the field by narrowing the possibilities. Finally, the tapes have an accompaning written guide. Each bird is listed with a black and white drawing, habitat type and a written description of the song/call. The authors also reference the page number to Petersons Field Guide of Western Birds and provide a space where the listner can write his/her comments. All in all, this is an excellent resource.
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Summary: Great Tool!!!!
Review: Great learning tool for the novice and a great reminder for the seasoned veteran.
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Summary: A great choice for the first step in learning birdsong
Review: If you live in North America east of the Mississipi and want to identify birds by ear, read on...This audio set is a very well thought out and produced tutorial for introducing beginning "ear" birders to the world of birding by ear. The audio quality is excellent with several renditions of each song and call. The pace is well suited to the target audience - only after repeated listening will you want to skip ahead through sections. The groupings of similar songs seem well designed, and reflect situations in the field that pose problems. Each song is described verbally, with an onomatopoetic description. I wish the CD were coded so that sub-tracks could be accessed directly without the introductory descriptions, but the design of this set isn't as encyclopedia of song, rather as short course in learning how to identify song. Buy this and the "More birding by ear", listen to them for 10 - 30 minutes a day (great drive time listening), and master the art of birding by ear!
Rating:
Summary: A great choice for the first step in learning birdsong
Review: If you live in North America east of the Mississipi and want to identify birds by ear, read on... This audio set is a very well thought out and produced tutorial for introducing beginning "ear" birders to the world of birding by ear. The audio quality is excellent with several renditions of each song and call. The pace is well suited to the target audience - only after repeated listening will you want to skip ahead through sections. The groupings of similar songs seem well designed, and reflect situations in the field that pose problems. Each song is described verbally, with an onomatopoetic description. I wish the CD were coded so that sub-tracks could be accessed directly without the introductory descriptions, but the design of this set isn't as encyclopedia of song, rather as short course in learning how to identify song. Buy this and the "More birding by ear", listen to them for 10 - 30 minutes a day (great drive time listening), and master the art of birding by ear!
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Summary: Richard K. Walton, author
Review: Most birdsong CDs/tapes are lengthy "lists" of birdsongs. The "Birding by Ear" series is a unique tutorial that teaches you to recognise and recall birdsongs. If you want to learn to identify birds by their songs and calls this is the product for you! Ideal for birders East of the Mississippi!
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Summary: Birding by Ear: A teaching tool for learning birdsong!
Review: Most birdsong tapes and CDs are lengthy references lists of names of birds followed by their vocalizations. The Birding by Ear series is different in that it provides a method for learning each song or call. If you want to LEARN birdsong...this is the product for you!
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Summary: Learn an alien language
Review: This book and cassettes changed my way of hearing the world. Like the joy and surprise of dreaming for the first time in a learned language, the Birding by Ear tapes and CDs open a new perspective on human surroundings which, it turns out, is populated by hundreds of species speaking to each other (and to you). A walk in the country or city is foerever altered if you hear and recognize birdsong.
Rating:
Summary: Learn an alien language
Review: This book and cassettes changed my way of hearing the world. Like the joy and surprise of dreaming for the first time in a learned language, the Birding by Ear tapes and CDs open a new perspective on human surroundings which, it turns out, is populated by hundreds of species speaking to each other (and to you). A walk in the country or city is foerever altered if you hear and recognize birdsong.
Rating:
Summary: Birding by Ear
Review: This is a great intro to bird songs. It has many common birds as well as several I had rarely seen but often heard. Its strength is that it is arranged in groups of similar-sounding birds, with narration that ties them together with memorization clues. This makes listening on my way to work amusing, and memorization not too tough. The weakness is that it is not easy to find the song of a particular bird if you want to identify something you just heard. A good companion would be a CD with lots of individual songs easily searchable, although such a format would not be nearly as easy to listen to for more than a few minutes. On the whole, a great start. Bike rides are more fun too, since you always hear more birds than you can see. After two years of listening to this each spring, I'm ordering the sequel, More Birding by Ear, as well as a more complete song collection for searching.
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