I live on the edge of Dyke Marsh Wildlife Preserve, rich with natural sounds, for which I have a bias; meaning, I love the sounds of nature. Now technically nature includes us humans, but I confess my bias is for sounds of birds, insects, frogs & toads, mammals, wind blowing through treetop leaves, water lapping at edges, and more. I like to record them, listen to them, share them with Cornell for citizen science, and even share some via SoundCloud with friends. Click on any of the recordings on the scrolling playlist above to listen!

My little playlist, above, sort of represents a sense of place here. Or does it?

In this region, I record sounds in short fragments. At home especially, though my condo abuts Dyke Marsh Wildlife Preserve, there are very few moments of the day or night when I can record natural sounds without also capturing the sounds of cars, airplanes, helicopters, canine friends in the nearby dog park, children’s giggles and squeals from the pool, people chatting and laughing in the picnic grove, and fire and police vehicles responding to neighbors in need. And certain days have even fewer moments — like Thursday’s near daylong mowing and/or blowing of cut grass and leaves! In an urban or suburban area — even those abutting natural places — it’s not easy to capture nature’s sounds.

That our brains naturally can, and do, filter out certain sounds is both a blessing and a curse. I recall a story about sound recordists at the Olympics making what we hear on tv “more real than real”. So for instance, the sound of splashes in the pool may be enhanced (or even faked!) so it sounds like you are right there in the pool with the Olympian swimmers! This awareness of how our brains work is utilized by producers in tv and film regularly, and certainly radio. The curse of our brain filtering and selecting for sound is that we may not fully notice the impact of our noise — anthropogenic noise — on each other or other species. Scientists have begun to study this, and that topic is for another time, but simply know that with this playlist, well, let’s just say that it too is “more real than real.”