Earth Notes: Wren Loud and Bold Ambient (2021-06)

Updated 2021-06-28 18:26 GMT.
By Damon Hart-Davis.
Ambient soundscape from 16WW back garden birdlife; small bird makes big noise! #wren #soundscape #fieldrecording
solar panels on garden wall
20210615 wren perched on vertical solar panel in garden
A couple of minutes of very loud constant contact/alarm calling from a bold wren that kept coming within a few feet of me, bellowing, as I sat in the garden.

It shouted while eating bugs off my apple-tree.

It shouted while standing on my garden solar panels.

It shouted while clinging vertically to my house wall!

This was early evening, and I think there were two of them at times.

It was suggested to me (by AF) that this was a proud recent new parent.

There's plenty of competition with background urban noises, and other birds! (Pigeons, jackdaws, crows, parakeets, at least...)

123s "20210625T1900Z wren loud contact calls in 16WW back garden" Uploaded . Download stereo MP3 clip 2820kB (may not be available in data-saver/lite mode), download low-bandwidth mono MP3 clip 726kB, hi-fi stereo lossless clip 12368kB.
Transcript:
[loud wren contact calls in June against suburban background noise in London UK]

Show Notes

All a bit rough and ready and neither the best of recording nor editing.

This was all happening a little after 7pm BST, ie between 18:00Z and 19:00Z.

Bonus video

40s "wren loud" (poster) Uploaded . Download MP4 clip 5269kB (may not be available in data-saver/lite mode), download low-bandwidth MP4 clip 1786kB, hi-fi/original MP4 clip 23432kB.
Transcript:
[wren making loud contact calls on solar panel and while feeding in apple tree]

Video on Twitter and on YouTube.

Accessibility

From an accessibility point of view I asked Should I add a transcript to the audio even if just [wren contact calls against urban background noise] of @MrFirthy, author of "Practical Web Inclusion & Accessibility".

He responded I think in this case, given that the content above it describes what’s in the audio well, it isn’t necessary - someone with a hearing impairment isn’t losing context because it’s trapped in the audio, which was not what I was expecting!

I had already jumped the shark and added [a few words in brackets] as the official http://schema.org transcript text for this and one other ambient piece. So I hope that I have now erred on the side of accessibility.

In any case, it's good to have the reasoning clear for next time. Thanks MrFirthy!

~344 words.