Love this app. It’s really made me realize how little bird diversity there is in the suburbs where I live.
I opened it up in a natural research area once and it lit up with so many more species than I’d ever heard near my house.
Merlin Bird ID
61–70 of 221 posts
Re: Merlin Bird ID
#62Fantastic app. My wife and I are gradually becoming able to recognise more and more birds by their call. This is great because the human ear is better than the app at rejecting environmental noise - so we can spot birds by their call even close to a noisy road when the app cannot. The app, at least on my Pixel 6, struggles with very high frequency calls - e.g. long-tailed tits. My best spot yet? A nightingale in Wimb…
My best spot yet was also a nightingale in Spain. I imagine the UK is even better for bird spotting.
Re: Merlin Bird ID
#63I normally use BirdNet app for birdsong, and it looks like that is from Cornell as well. Does Merlin use the same tech under the covers?
Re: Merlin Bird ID
#64I love this app and use it every few days. The Macaulay Library at Cornell, where this app is made/supported, has a short write up on the underlying tech here:
https://www.macaulaylibrary.org/2021/06/22/behind-the-scenes...
Re: Merlin Bird ID
#65I was thinking of trying to run this at home: https://github.com/tphakala/birdnet-go
Go for it. Running it for quite some time at home. Very easy to deploy, regular updates.
Re: Merlin Bird ID
#66We have a Mockingbird in our backyard (or more precisely, we live in his/her territory) that impersonates a Gila woodpecker. We were able to record it. Playing back the video and using Bird ID actually shows it as a Gila Woodpecker.
Oh, that's not my experience at all! I downloaded this app to see how many distinct songs a mockingbird was singing one time (it was a lot) and the app just came back: "Mockingbird". I was both amazed and disappointed!
Re: Merlin Bird ID
#67I would love for someone to make a birding/citizen scientist app that's well gamified. This is basically pokemon. You go places and find different creatures and collect them.
I would love to play that game, and the data could maybe be useful for researchers.
On the other hand, people playing Pokemon GO trespassed private property and protected spaces, so I wonder how far would the players of this game go just to make a pic of a "legendary" animal at the border of extinction.
Re: Merlin Bird ID
#68I know there are many apps for plant identification but does anyone have a recommendation for a good one?
(iSeek mentioned in another comment doesn't seem to be available on iOS where I live)
Re: Merlin Bird ID
#69I know there are many apps for plant identification but does anyone have a recommendation for a good one? (iSeek mentioned in another comment doesn't seem to be available on iOS where I live)
Seek by inaturalist
Re: Merlin Bird ID
#70It's worth being aware that the developer of the Android app asserts that "...this app doesn't share user data with other companies or organizations" but according to Exodus Privacy this is not true: https://reports.exodus-privacy.eu.org/en/reports/com.labs.me...