Hearing the Striated Grass-wren

[Colin Reid <>]

Hi

I am 65 and experiencing hearing loss in the upper range - typically, Grasswrens ect. One thing I have tried - and it might be worth considering…….

I have a Tascam DR-05 hand held recorder which I have used, quite successfully, to tape songs and calls. A friend of mine with much better hearing than myself, suggested plugging in headphones or ear things and setting the recorder to standby. This has worked to some extent, although it is very noisy as you walk around and takes a bit of manipulation to hold it steady, manage the ear things, the connecting wire etc. Maybe wireless EarPod-style things would work better? It may even be that by using the Voice Memo function on a phone would also suffice? I haven’t tried that. Might be worth a go? Cause its a pain in the ass when people keep asking you ‘Can you hear that?’ and you can only answer ‘Hear what’?…..

Good luck!

Cheers

Colin

On 12 Oct 2020, at 1:00 pm, Peter Shute <> wrote:

I'm interested to hear if anyone has had any success with listening devices for species like these.

There used to be a device called a SongFinder available, but I believe it's been discontinued. It wasn't cheap.

I've been wanting to try my bat detector on them, but haven't had a chance. Also not cheap, and they're usually designed to filter out frequencies like these that would be low for a bat.

I have seen both species on Nowingi Track in Hattah-Kulkyne, but didn't detect them by ear. We once had a pair of Mallee Emu-wrens feeding around us just a couple of metres away, but I could still barely hear them. I doubt I'd hear them at all now, 10 years later, but maybe my hearing aids would help. My second sighting was just a fluke - saw one flutter across briefly.

Given my low success rate for seeing any MEWs at all each time I tried, it's possible that the reason you didn't hear any was because they weren't there. How would you know?

Peter Shute

---

From: Birding-Aus <m("birding-aus.org","birding-aus-bounces");" class="">> on behalf of David Dickson <m("iinet.net.au","daviddickson1");" class="">>
Sent: Monday, 12 October 2020 11:58 AM
To: m("birding-aus.org","birding-aus");" class=""> <m("birding-aus.org","birding-aus");" class="">>
Subject: [Birding-Aus] Hearing the Striated Grass-wren

 

I have dipped on sighting the Striated Grass-wren and the Mallee Emu-wren on each of my last three trips to Hattah-Kulkyne NP. I use the approach to finding these birds suggested by Rohan Clarke and Tim Dolby, “walk slowly and quietly while listening for their high-pitched calls.” I have spent days trawling through ideal mallee spinifex habitat and heard not a squeak - deafening silence. I would say my hearing is in the normal range for someone my age - 67.
Is there a readily affordable microphone that can pick up the high frequency calls and ‘convert’ them into something I can hear? I imagine that people interested in bats face a similar problem and are able to access equipment that enables them to hear their calls.
Yours
Dave Dickson


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