Baltimore orioles will surprise you. macaulaylibrary.org/asset/657196...

I call this micro-season "Next year I'll study warbler songs before they arrive."

A Baltimore oriole type 3 singer also arrived today. Whether it is Lord Trestleton himself remains to be seen (I have my doubts...) See podcast episodes 2 and 3. podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/e...

Second Baltimore oriole this season is a type-2 singer, but one with a final "chip" instead of a bell-shaped note. Could this be BAOR 11 from last year? (See Podcast Episode 5). podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/e...

It's Baltimore oriole time again at the Charles River Peninsula. First bird back is a type 1 singer (see Podcast Episode 5) podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/e...

I call this microseason, "Where are the fox sparrows? Did I miss the fox sparrows?"

I call this micro-season "Ducks fly screaming from the trees."

1990. Sitting outside the library looking over Arisugawa Park wondering if it was too late to change my dissertation from US-Japan relations to the social interaction of large-billed crows. (it was)

First spring peepers. And while I listened, a raven circled, its GAA echoing across the meadow. #easter

Third installment of The Public Sphere of Birds, collecting U.S. newspaper items related to birds, 1801-1810. Includes documentation of the promotion and reception of Wilson's Ornithology and the increasing use of bird metaphors in political discourse. #envhist #envhum archive.org/details/publ...

New work from myself, @kasiawojczulanis.bsky.social @lsburchardt.bsky.social : seabird calls share not only efficiency universals, but also prosodic patterns with our speech. Rallentando rhythms carry info absent in spectra. 🔊🐧 www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

野鳥と文学 (wild birds and literature) is a great work of comparative [British/American/Japanese] bird literature, though it does lean pretty heavily on the contributions of W.H. Hudson... At any rate, I remain haunted by the book's reference to a companion cassette of recorded birdsong....

My new project, The Public Sphere of Birds, collects bird-related articles in U.S. American newspapers and highlights the ways in which birds have been figured as rhetorical actors and communication media. Volume 1, covering 1713 to 1776, is out today. archive.org/details/publ...

I think it's safe to say it is spring now.

Back to basics

I'm here for the birdsong appreciation moments in ゲゲゲの女房 (GeGeGe no Nyōbō, NHK, 2010, Ep 120). MIZUKI Shigeru's daughter hears a bird and thinks it's a sparrow. He corrects her: that's a varied tit (ヤマガラ). She listens to the song with renewed enthusiasm.

Remarkable. Calum Johnston: Song of the Thrush (Oran a' Smeoraich) recorded by Alan Lomax in 1951. archive.culturalequity.org/field-work/s...

Tsuchika NISHIMURA, Winter 2026 Free Style (フリースタイル）cover art. Please note detail at the bottom of the full image. webfreestyle.com/collections/...

In the waning hours of winter break, I have decided to start birding the work of IZUMI Kyōka (who participated in the founding of the Wild Bird Society of Japan). Off to a good start.

Just uploaded Episode 6 of A Distinct Success as a Bird, which explores the relationships between Baltimore oriole song and human music. peteroehlkers.podbean.com/e/episode-6-...

while I was waiting for the otter to re-emerge from its hole, the sun came up

Just uploaded The Complete Little Stories for Bedtime by Thornton W. Burgess, 1917. Please enjoy. archive.org/details/twb-...

Brief resort-limited DR trip. Made a handful of new friends, including Carpintero, Chichilín, Vencejito, and Petigre, and hung out with Rey Congo on the deck (pictured here). #birds

My daughter crocheted me a Juan Carlos Bodoque finger puppet for Xmas.

"People's Home Journal Green Meadow Club Bird Sanctuaries Campaigns (1917-1925)," a collection of bird protection-related articles written by Thornton W. Burgess and William T. Hornaday, along with a few illustrations by Harrison Cady. archive.org/details/phj-...

My happy place rn is pop music from late 1960s Japan. youtube.com/playlist?lis...

A Distinct Success as a Bird. Episode 5: Oriole Philology. Just uploaded (also available via Apple podcasts). peteroehlkers.podbean.com/e/episode-5-...

Mid-August Baltimore oriole long song. macaulaylibrary.org/asset/640132...

Article in August issue of Bird Observer. The Blackbirds of Boxford: Early American Wild Bird Advocacy. www.birdobserver.org/Issues/2025/...

Senjōgahara, Oku-Nikkō, Japan.

It is well known that gray catbirds copy the songs of other birds, including Baltimore orioles. But why would this catbird (top) sing the syllables of the oriole song (bottom) in reverse order? #birds #bioacoustics

The image of Japan as a bird-friendly nation influenced 19th century U.S. discourse about bird protection. www.birdobserver.org/Issues/2025/...

Baltimore orioles are thought to have individually unique songs, but some communities share songs. I recorded this song exchange, involving three or four different orioles, three days in a row. #birds #fieldrecording ebird.org/checklist/S2...

Weird ultrasonic specters in my spectrogram. Anyone know what these might be? Daytime recording. Audiomoth. #fieldrecording

Just finished Toshitaka Suzuki's professional memoir 僕には鳥の言葉がわかる [I understand the words of birds], an invitation for everyone to become more "tori-lingual." Especially impressed by the thoughtfulness of his media strategies in trying to spread the word about animal linguistics.

The 27th different Baltimore oriole song I recorded this spring is one of the best. Check out the vibrato. And the jaunty ending. #birds #fieldrecording macaulaylibrary.org/asset/635694...

Listeners to the Trestleton episodes of my podcast may be pleased to know that Lord and Lady Trestleton have returned to the trestle. peteroehlkers.podbean.com/e/episode-2-...

Braved the pollen and went recording this morning, and good thing! The orioles are back, Orchard and Baltimore. The Baltimore I recorded is a veteran male, singing a variation of the dominant song at the property.

Just uploaded, 1916 volume of The Complete Little Stories for Bedtime by Thornton W. Burgess. twbresearchleague.blogspot.com/2025/04/the-...

Wondering exactly where Meaningful Stone (김뜻돌) sourced the soundscape recording for the end of "10AM." American robin/blue jay/northern cardinal/mourning dove could easily be my backyard. youtu.be/DOl6BryH0JQ?...

Took all afternoon, but I finally tracked down this passage by Christopher Gedner (Linné's student) which spuriously introduced a second "Colonial America regrets putting bounties on blackbirds" tale into the entomology literature. The first is this one: wingedwardens.blogspot.com/2011/02/new-...

Oh yellow-bellied sapsucker, you could be in Costa Rica right now, but instead you are here in freezing weather, huddled against a branch of the mountain laurel in front of my house, waiting for the squirrel to get off the suet feeder.

Birdsong identification talk on Japanese TV. "Don't Mejiro (Japanese white-eye) go 'kyuu-kyuu'?" Alice-san chi no Iroribata, Episode 1.

A reference in 鳥たちのフランス文学 has sent me next to Pascal Quignard's Dans ce jardin qu'on aimait, about Simeon Pease Cheney, 19th century American spiritualist birdsong transcriber.

Latest personal translation project arrives from Kinokuniya. French Bird Lit in Japanese. (details in Alt text)

Podcast Episode 4. A two-hour recording of my June 11 kayak trip up the Charles River and back, oriole song indicated in episode description timeline. podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/e...

Dismal New Year’s morn, but if you listen carefully, you may hear a pair of bluebirds.

"쑥국 쑥국 쑥쑥국 쑥국" is the signature birdsong moment in some contemporary arrangements of the Korean song "새 타령" (Sae Taryeong/Bird Song). I asked Gemini what species it was intended to represent and it scolded me, in Korean, for being too literal-minded.

I will never get used to ruddy turnstones as beach chair scavengers. #birds

At the end of the day, maybe my role in life is to provide fansub-style culture notes for folks who want to understand the bird jokes in "Talentless Takano" (Netflix). #無能の鷹野