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Beverly and Anders Gyllenhaal

Beverly and Anders Gyllenhaal

Beverly's Birding Basics

What’s that tune? New, improved Merlin app has the answers.

by Beverly and Anders Gyllenhaal June 24, 2021
written by Beverly and Anders Gyllenhaal

            One of the most useful skills for birders is learning to recognize birdsongs by ear. Just when you think you’ve heard a Robin, a bright red bird shows up instead. It’s a Summer Tanager, often described as a Robin with a sore throat.  And what about those cute little nuthatches? They all sound a bit like squeaky toys, but which species is which?

The cover of the Merlin app. Note the “Sound ID” in the lineup.

           Not a moment too soon, the Cornell Lab of Ornithology has just added sound recognition to its free Merlin Bird ID app. This birdsong tool turns a great birding app into a superb one.

            When you’re outside and not sure what bird you’re hearing, you can press a button on the app to record a clip of the song. Instantly, Merlin will suggest the most likely songsters. It doesn’t guarantee 100 percent accuracy all of the time, but this is the next best thing to having an expert “ear” birder at your side wherever you go.

            We’ve been using a version of this software in another Cornell app called BirdNET for the past year or so. Now a version of a similar system has been added to Merlin to give the lab’s most popular app four different ways of identifying birds. The sound element is easy to use and also helps you to get more familiar with those hard-to-remember calls and songs.

            Merlin and BirdNET are both available for free in the Apple App Store and Google Play. If you’ve already got the Merlin app, you can add the sound recognition element with a quick upgrade. Here’s Cornell’s list of instructions for everything you need to know about how to use Sound ID.

 

            Over the past year, as scores of people discovered the joys of birding during the stay-at-home stage of the pandemic, we built a section on Flying Lessons called Beverly’s Basics to help newcomers get started. This post will be added to our library of stories that range from how to get started to buying your first binoculars to what to take along on the trail.             

 

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June 24, 2021 0 comment
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BirdingPhotographySpecies

A visit to this exotic bird park is the perfect medicine for the winter blues

by Beverly and Anders Gyllenhaal February 20, 2021
written by Beverly and Anders Gyllenhaal

Blue-crowned Pigeon

SCOTLAND NECK, N.C. — It was well into winter, and after weeks of grim headlines and overcast skies, I decided the only cure for a badly bruised equilibrium was a flock of flying things with amazing feathers.

The drab sparrows and robins outside our windows just weren’t doing the trick. A situation this dire required a shot of spring’s iridescent blue, startling orange and lemon yellow. With a nod of apology to my birding binoculars, my husband Anders and I grabbed our coats and drove to the zoo.

But not just any zoo. The 18-acre Sylvan Heights Bird Park in Eastern North Carolina is home to nearly 300 species, mostly rare, spanning five continents.

Caribbean Flamingo

Right at the entrance, a herd of lanky Caribbean Flamingos, each one attired in a ballet-skirt flounce of pinkish-orange feathers, stood perfectly still for as long as we wanted to watch.

The flamingos turned out to be a mere appetizer in this colorful feast. In a nearby enclosure was the Scarlet Ibis, decked out in a deeply hued combo of peach and coral.

These birds were more than enough to overhaul my mood, but the tour would go on in similar fashion over the next couple of hours. Anders needed to be prodded loose from one display area to the next. For a photographer used to wild birds, these tasty morsels were sitting ducks. “I feel like I’m cheating,” he said.

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February 20, 2021 0 comment
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Beverly's Birding BasicsBirdingConservationHow we're birding now

Lessons in generosity: Birds benefit when we’re all welcoming on the trail

by Beverly and Anders Gyllenhaal October 7, 2020
written by Beverly and Anders Gyllenhaal

Smack in the middle of bustling Washington, D.C., near the highest elevation of the city’s Rock Creek Park, lies a clearing that’s proven to be a prime spot to see migratory birds.

At dawn every spring morning, some of the country’s best birders sit here, along a stone wall, sharing their wisdom with anyone who happens along. These veterans are beyond generous, throwing out identifications with the glimpse of a flight pattern or silhouette. Lucky for us, this became our birding classroom each migration season while we lived nearby.

The unforgettable plumage of a Pileated Woodpecker. Photos by Anders Gyllenhaal

We’ve been thinking about that experience as we’ve pondered some questions we believe are more crucial than ever: What’s the best way to make progress as a birder? What helps move you from novice to intermediate, from backyard birder to one who takes birding vacations? And how can we welcome anyone interested in nature to learn what we’re seeing?

The way of birding is definitely a path, and ours started with simple curiosity about what we were seeing on weekend trips to the Blue Ridge Mountains and Maryland’s Eastern Shore. We’ll never forget our first encounter with a Pileated Woodpecker or the time we stumbled upon an Indigo Bunting singing in a field filled with wildflowers. In the early days, we once followed a flock of vultures for half an hour, wondering if they might be some type of unusual hawk.

Not long after, we registered for a beginner’s bird walk. Our leader pointed out species we didn’t know existed and gave us a peek through his powerful binoculars. The world of birds came into focus for the first time, and that changed everything.

This is our new column running in the latest issue of American Bird Conservancy magazine and reprinted here with permission from the Bird Conservation quarterly. The column, under the name Flying Lessons, is meant to draw on our travels to explore what we’re learning from birds. While we had to put off our birding trips this spring and summer, we’re now back on the road again.  We’ll post these columns as they appear. You can get a subscription to the magazine if you donate $40 or more to the conservancy. Here’s the donation link. 
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October 7, 2020 1 comment
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Birding researchMigration

Spring migration helped save our sanity; can the fall migration finish the job?

by Beverly and Anders Gyllenhaal September 4, 2020
written by Beverly and Anders Gyllenhaal

Last spring, in the midst of the monotonous stay-at-home months, the spring migration not only saved the sanity of many but it helped launch a wave of new birders who discovered the wonders of the avian world just outside their windows.

As the fall migration gets started, it’s time to get back on the trails and pick up where we left off. If you are new to birding, there are some important things to know.

Juvenile Bald Eagles look nothing like the white-headed adults they will become. Photo by Anders Gyllenhaal

First off, a lot of birds will look much different than they did a few months before, making identifications tricky. That’s because some species, particularly male warblers, shed their brilliant breeding feathers, and the new ones aren’t nearly so distinct and colorful. Some guidebooks go so far as to call the fall birds drab.

To make matters more complicated, many young birds, eagles and gulls for example, are all splotchy and streaked and look nothing like their black-and-white parents.

Before you head out, it’s helpful to page through a guidebook to compare the fall and spring birds. And if you haven’t yet used the Merlin Bird ID app from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, this is the time to start. Merlin is a free bird identification wizard that combines science, data and your cell phone’s geolocation. All you have to do is answer three simple questions, and the list of possible birds pops right up on your screen. Click here for more info.

The startling page of the Merlin Bird ID app

The good news is that the fall migration offers a lot of chances to practice your identification skills. This is a slow-motion show that stretches from mid-summer through the beginning of January. If you happen to miss one group, never fear. Billions of birds from hundreds of species are close behind, with ducks and geese generally bringing up the rear. Even within the same species, a few birds can arrive early and a few will be stragglers.

The timing varies depending on where you live.

Ducks like these Blue-winged Teals move south late in the migration.

For new birders busy building a life list of sightings, knowing exactly what to see when and where can be vexing – especially in a time of social distancing. Fall is usually a great time to take birding walks led by experts from local Audubon chapters, nature centers and at fall birding festivals. (While these group outings aren’t available for Fall 2020, another option might be to hire a private guide. Google “birding tour guides” for your location of interest.)

One other helpful tool is called BirdCast, a joint project between the Colorado State University, Cornell and the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, that provides real-time projections on its website and in alerts about the amount of migrating birds around the country. BirdCast even has a tool where you can search your area for real-time alerts as to how prevalent migrating birds are on any given night. Click here.

A sample of a BirdCast map, showing the highest migration action in the Upper Midwest and across the South. You can get projections for your area simply by plugging in your location.

Developed over 20 years, the concept tracks the daily flow of birds during the migrations, which is useful for protecting birds, conservation efforts and also to help birders know when the chances are best of seeing birds. Much of the migration action is aloft at night, but birdwatchers can improve their chances of spotting birds the following days on the ground.

And here’s a portion of a post we wrote last spring about the expansion of Cornell’s newest and most powerful tool for birders that will help with your fall migration planning. These are beautiful and information-rich maps and animations that track most of the North American species over each month of the year. You can find a complete list of the maps by species here on the Cornell website.

The full development of these maps are so valuable to birders that Beverly and I couldn’t agree on what’s most important here. So we thought we’d each make our case and let you come to your own conclusions.

Canada Warbler / Photo by James Hully, Macaulay Library, Cornell Lab of Ornithology

Beverly: The best way to appreciate this work is to start by looking at one of these animations. They’re beautiful, with patches of bright colors flowing back and forth across a map of the hemisphere that represent migrating birds week by week throughout the year.  I think these are the most compelling — and entertaining — of all the maps and illustrations that come under Cornell’s eBird umbrella. 

For example, here’s an animation of how the tiny Canada Warbler travels the length of the hemisphere twice a year. 

Not only can you watch the warblers’ weekly progress from far north Canada to Latin America and back, but you can use these maps to help figure out when they’re like to pass by you. And when you’re trying to find a bird you’ve never seen before, knowing exactly when the largest flocks are arriving is a huge help.

Anders: The point is that animations like the Canada Warbler, along with abundance, range and breeding maps, now exist for 610 species, which make up the bulk of the species in North America, in archives Cornell calls status and trends maps.

The lab began putting these together about two years ago as a way to convert their raw bird data into practical maps and show how birds move through the seasons of the year. The first batch of maps covered about 20 percent of the species, but the addition of the rest of the species opens all sorts of possibilities for comprehensive research and conservation approaches.

“This is a big jump in terms of the utility of the data project,’’ said Daniel Fink, a senior research associate at the Cornell Lab.

Go to the end of this post for a summary of the full lineup of birding options from Cornell. 

Beverly: Any dedicated birder will be excited about the research and conservation possibilities. But the reason to put a focus on the birders in all of this is that we are helping to create the data.

Every time birders file checklists of species on their eBird app, Cornell collects the data in the first step of the process. Each checklist tells the number of birds spotted and exactly where they were.

As eBird has gained traction, the number of users has risen dramatically — with a total of 500,000 regular users to date who together have filed about 42 million checklists. That’s a lot of birds.

In the past two years alone, the number of visitors to eBird overall has nearly doubled, jumping from 2.6 million in 2017 to 5.2 million in 2019, said Ian Davies, the eBird project coordinator. About half of those visitors submit checklists of the birds they see that, once enhanced by radar and weather data, is the raw material for Cornell’s maps and animations.

“I never fail to be amazed at the collective power of people who appreciate birds,” said Davies. “None of this would be possible without people who care about birds.”

Anders: That’s a really important point, and I would guess one of the reasons contributors are increasing so much is because birders understand how our checklists serve the greater good.

Amanda Rodewald

Amanda Rodewald, director of conservation science at the lab and an ornithology professor at Cornell, said wildlife managers and bird organizations are using the data and maps to guide conservation plans — including more targeted measures than weren’t possible in the past.

One of the best examples is in California’s Central Valley, one of the nation’s agricultural centers that doubles as a flyway for birds. Biologists are working with farmers to flood their fields during a few weeks of migration to provide stopover for migrating birds. 

This has dramatically increased the birds coming through, and also enables farming on those fields for all but a few weeks of the year.

“This project gives us so much more information from which we’re able to make really good decisions about the kind of conservation actions that are needed,’’ Rodewald said.

Beverly: The great thing about using these apps for birding is that you get back as much as you’re giving. 

Every time you file a checklist, you’re building a lifetime list of every bird you’ve ever seen. Cornell stores the information online in your personal account, and you can refer back to your checklists at any time or download your own data. You can also see the checklists of other birders to figure out which species you’re most likely to see, and where, on any given day. We almost always use eBird to help us choose where to go birding — and even at what time of day. We use the companion app called Merlin Bird ID to help us immediately identify birds we don’t yet know. I still can’t believe it’s all free.

Anders: The last point to make is that this data and mapping provides the research firepower at a time when understanding the science of birds can help protect them.

Scientists once had to work from rough estimates of bird populations, and mere guesses about migration. Now they can draw on precision data on what birds are doing, how many there are and where they’re going.

In the last year alone, we’ve seen some of the most important avian research of our times, including major studies on the loss of about a third of the bird population, shifts in the timing of migration in North America and the likely impacts of climate change on birds. All told, eBird data has been used in about 300 scientific studies around the world. 

“The data allows us just an unparalleled lens into the movement, the distribution and the abundance of birds,’’ said Cornell’s Amanda Rodewald.

The Barn Swallow is one of 610 species featured in maps and animations./ Photo by Brian E. Kushner, provided by Cornell Lab of Ornithology

Cornell data on birds comes in several forms, all free and each with different strengths. The most useful and portable for the birder in the field is found on the eBird smartphone app, which draws from raw data and is the most up to date guidance on where birds can be found. The eBird app is also how you file checklists and keep up with your life list. The companion Merlin Bird ID smartphone app can help you identify birds you see. On the Cornell eBird website, you can find a wealth of maps and species data. For maps and species information, go to the Explore section of the website. You’ll find an introduction to the status and trends maps that are the subject of this post under the Science section of the Cornell website. With so many places you can go for data, it can be confusing to find your way. But if you learn to use all these tools, they provide excellent guidance for finding species, understanding their practices and habitat and tracking their paths through the year.

Beverly: Let’s wind things up with an animation, this one of the Barn Swallow, another long-distance migratory bird that travels from Canada to the southernmost reaches of South America. It’s fall, and all these birds are headed our way. I can’t wait to get out there and start counting!

September 4, 2020 0 comment
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In-depth stories

Grasshopper Sparrow

Here are links to some of the deeper stories we’ve written for publications from the Washington Post to The Miami Herald exploring the frontiers of birding and avian research. This story for the Post was about the role of every-day birders in creating the largest citizen science project in the world. This piece for The Herald looked at the surprising strength of the Roseate Spoonbill in the midst of climate change. And this article and video for The News & Observer and Charlotte Observer is about how some adventurous hummingbirds are abandoning their migration and staying the winter in the U.S. Our latest story in the Washington Post is about a rescue mission for the imperiled Florida Grasshopper Sparrow. 

Miami Herald’s Spoonbill package

Some favorite birds

Barred Owl Orlando, Florida
Copyright by Anders and Beverly Gyllehhaal
Ruby-throated Hummingbird West Stockbridge, Massachusetts
Copyright by Anders and Beverly Gyllehhaal
Hairy Woodpecker Prime Hook Refuge, Delaware
Copyright by Anders and Beverly Gyllehhaal
Prairie Warbler Cape May, New Jersey
Copyright by Anders and Beverly Gyllehhaal
Red-bellied Woodpecker St. Joe Overstreet Landing, Florida
Copyright by Anders and Beverly Gyllehhaal
Eastern Wood-Peewee Rock Creek Park, Washington, DC
Copyright by Anders and Beverly Gyllehhaal
Eastern Meadowlark Kissimmee, Florida
Copyright by Anders and Beverly Gyllehhaal
Black-throated Blue Warbler Raleigh, North Carolina
Copyright by Anders and Beverly Gyllehhaal
Northern Flicker Alexandria, Virginia
Copyright by Anders and Beverly Gyllehhaal

Birds in Flight

Roseate Spoonbill BIRDS IN FLIGHT FELLSMERE, FLORIDA OSPREY BIRDS IN FLIGHT Orlando, Florida American Flamingo BIRDS IN FLIGHT Rio Largartos, Mexico COPYRIGHT BY ANDERS AND BEVERLY GYLLENHAAL EASTERN MEADOWLARK BIRDS IN FLIGHT KISSIMMEE, FLORIDA Red-shouldered Hawk BIRDS IN FLIGHT Orlando, Florida COPYRIGHT BY ANDERS AND BEVERLY GYLLENHAAL PALM WARBLER BIRDS IN FLIGHT ORLANDO, FLORIDA BLUE-GRAY GNATCATCHER BIRDS IN FLIGHT LORTON, VIRGINIA BROWN PELICAN BIRDS IN FLIGHT ASSATEAGUE, MARYLAND COPYRIGHT BY ANDERS AND BEVERLY GYLLENHAAL WOOD STORK BIRDS IN FLIGHT MELBOURNE, FLORIDA COPYRIGHT BY ANDERS AND BEVERLY GYLLENHAAL

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Quotes for the birds

“It’s a short path from the joy and wonder of birds to the recognition of what they’re telling us about the environment, and what that compels us to do.”

— David Ringer, chief network officer for The National Audubon Society

Comments, Suggestions & Quips:

On How Birds Teach Humility:

–“NOB. Love it! Great little truths in this post.” – Chara Daum

— “Appreciate your insights, Beverly.” -Ruth Harrell

— “Loving your Flying Lessons blog.” -Susan May, San Francisco

On our offbeat video of a Tufted Titmouse singing along with a banjo:

“That is totally cool,” Tony Mas, Dahlonega, Ga.

“This brought a smile to us. Thanks.” John Deen, St. Paul, MN.

“Really amazing.” Florence Strickland, Sunset Beach, N.C.

On the Mandarin duck’s arrival in Central Park:

— “I think he gets his own Saturday morning now.” -Stephen Colby, Raleigh, N.C.

— “What a beautiful bird. Its colors look painted on. Magnificent.” -Christine DiMattei

On the falling numbers of Wild Turkeys:

“I was just mentioning this to a friend, how I used to see Wild Turkeys every time I hit a dirt road, and now it’s almost rare.” -Jeff Brooks.

“There are a hundred times more turkeys than when I was a kid. Fake BS to shake down donations and public funding.” -Vance Shearer

 

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About us

About us

We’re two journalists who’ve traded in our work in publishing and syndicated writing for following and photographing the birds. We live in Raleigh, NC, but are traveling the country every chance we get -- and are sharing the lessons birds are teaching us and the photos we take along the way.

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Why Flying Lessons

This website is about what we can learn from the birds around us. Some of the lessons are obvious, such as the way birds can be a barometer of environmental changes. Others are subtle, like the way you, as an observer, have to adapt to navigate the world in which birds operate. We ourselves still have much to learn about birding, a late-in-life pursuit that has captivated us in retirement. But we decided to start writing about the lessons and teachings as we’re finding our way, in hopes that our storytelling and photography will help to celebrate a captivating element of nature.

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