Hi, I trust that everybody is having a fine Christmas!
Internationally, it has become widely acknowledged that the Merlin bird identification app, now managed by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, has revolutionised bird identification. I have used it in both North America and Europe with great success. With the release
of the Australian Merlin databases a few months ago, I presume that lots of people are also using Merlin in this country for bird of identification. Many thanks to all those who have submitted high-quality photographs to eBird Australia that has made it possible
for Merlin to work in our nation. Obviously it still has some way to go before we have most or all the Australian species in Merlin, but it is well along the way.
And now, building on the Merlin resource, just in case you did not get what you wanted from Santa, what about this gem that you will be able to purchase in a few months time: the Swarovski Optik Digital Guide Monocular https://optics-info.com/swarovski-digital-guide/
.
The way it works, apparently, is that you look at the bird through the monocular, click a button to take a photograph of it, and the monocular miraculously sends the photo to the Merlin app on your smartphone. The app either identifies the bird that you saw,
and provides field-guide-type information on it, or gives you a short list of species that closely match it, in a similar way to how we use Merlin now by loading a photo to it, or by entering identification features, on a smartpone. As with Merlin now, you
don't need internet or mobile phone access to use the resources.
First there was the field guide book, then the bird calls on cassette, then the iPod version of the field guides plus bird calls, then the smartphone app, and now the Digital Guide Monocular. Let's see who will be the first to review it here. It might just
be me as I am in a ballot (along with umpteen thousand others) to receive a free Digital Monocular from Cornell!
Best wishes – David
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David McDonald
1004 Norton Road
Wamboin NSW 2620
Australia
E:
M: 0416 231 890 (national)
M: +61 416 231 890 (international)
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