Merlin App Appreciation plus General Birding Chat

[DiggoryVenn]

A thread for all lovers of the Merlin app (app that allows you to identify birds by their sound). A place to share what you have spotted, ask questions and any other bird chat.

Caveat: I am pretty much a novice birdwatcher myself.

Mine for today: not sure about the Cetti's warbler but I could positively identify the rest.

A bit of patience is sometimes needed with those, to wait till they spiral round to the front of the tree.

I didn’t use Merlin when out yesterday at WWT Martin mere, but did see lots of ducklings including very cute shelducklings. Also lots of moorchicks and cootlings.

I have the same problem - just ask it to resend the email and it seems to restart the counter. Not found a solution, however.

Just found this thread. I love the Merlin app. Only discovered it last month. I have lots of feeders in my garden and get a variety of visitors.

Oh, I’ve found my people! I’m deaf so I can’t actually hear the birds but love the Merlin app so I can identify them.

I bloody love it and tell everyone about it!

Love the Merlin app too. I volunteer in a woodland garden once a week and I get so excited if I pick something new up.

Another confirmed Merlin apper here! 👋🏼

A family of blue tits visiting my garden are getting through fat balls like they’re going out of fashion. The fledglings are still waiting in a nearby tree to be fed, but they’ll be making their wobbly attempts to visit the feeder themselves soon.

i love this app
i have a great spotted wood pecker the other day, although i wouldnt have known it, as well as the common redstart
every day there is a robin but i dont feel confident to make the guess myself
i have kept the recording of the ravens
i saw a Jay and i was desperate for it to make a noise but it didnt

and i was sure i saw house martins the other day and retraced my foot steps to capture them, but they didnt appear, i see their nests though

You need to download the database for the area you are visiting! Otherwise it’s using the Northern European one you download when you started.

It can’t pick up total outliers like a bird blown off course when migrating because it isn’t expecting that bird to be in the geographical area.

Likewise, it can’t identify the birds of Egypt and Greece if it’s only got the U.K. birds to choose from.

I’ve had some good results using the app abroad (after downloading the correct data pack). As the area I went to is known to be a migration hot spot, I downloaded the Western Paleartic pack, which covers all of Europe, North Africa and part of the Middle East.

It picked up all sorts of birds, but in spite of my massive data pack, it struggled with the noisiest birds I saw - flamingos. Fortunately those are pretty easy to identify by sight!

lots of birds this morning, however merlin failed to pick up the Raven which i absolutely saw and heard
had another Redstart
i do like to retrace my steps to where i heard a blackcap for example, and check it picks it up again

For me, the easiest way to spot tree creepers is to look for birds that fly diagonally from the top of a tree trunk towards the bottom of another tree. Tree creepers can only creep up trees, so they have to occasionally fly down so that they can creep up again! It may not sound like it, but once you get your eye in, the way they move between trees is so distinctive - fast and at a crazy angle.

I saw a few of them at the weekend, including one that was feeding a fledgling. I could only see their silhouettes, but it still felt special to witness 🥰

Good tip @Festina!
if you see a bird working its way down a trunk it’s probably a nuthatch. They’re pretty distinctive.

I once saw a treecreeper and a nuthatch on the same tree - one spiralling up, the other spiralling down

Thank you for your suggestion. It didn't actually work for me because after 5 days the app took away the option to resend. However, I managed to do it 😀 there was an option to confirm email at the top of the settings menu and that worked first time.

Did they have a stand-off halfway up (or down) the tree?

I had hopes!

This is amazing, I had no idea treecreepers could only spiral up! 😊 I’ll watch for that flight pattern. I don’t think I’ve seen a nuthatch either , though app has picked up a couple. I love hearing something new and working out where it is from the flashing sound, even if not spotting it straight away.

One of my absolute favourites is the tiny Goldcrest which I now know is the smallest Uk bird, not the wren. There are quite a lot around here and once heard a firecrest but it was too high to see.

I’ve turned into such a geek, coming out of bushes with my phone and twigs in my hair excitedly telling passers by about xyz, bird, and mostly they don’t give a shit, but I’ve converted a few to the app 🤣

I get nuthatches on my feeder occasionally - they go for the sunflower hearts. Suck sleek and elegant little birds!

I downloaded it about a months ago, and I love it. It alerted me to a raven sitting right at the top of a tree, which I would have missed, and also made me realise just how many blackcaps there are on my usual walking route - I’d always assumed they were robins. I now have several on my ‘heard’ list that I’m trying to upgrade to my ‘seen’ list.

I’d love to see a raven!
I read ‘A Shadow Above’ by Joe Shute which is a book about ravens. They are pests in some areas of Scotland, apparently.

I also read that book @MagpiePi. It’s fascinating, if a little gruesome in places.

I see ravens regularly where I live, but never get tired of watching them.

I was recommending the merlin app to my brother this morning and then came here to find this thread 🙂. I use it all the time when I'm out and about. I'm not good at identifying birds "by ear" from their song, and while I can for some very common species, in general I find it quite difficult so this app helps me a lot.

I've had young goldfinches in the garden today for the first time. I think they like Nigella seeds so will be buying some to put out for them to encourage them to stay round and about. They are such pretty little birds, a delight for the eye.

Yes, it is a bit gruesome - poor lambs!

He's also written a book about rats ('Stowaway; The disreputable exploits of the rat) which is really interesting too. He goes from a position of hating and fearing rats to owning them as pets.