Hoopoe – A blog by nhbs – Page 84 – The NHBS Conservation Hub

Wildlife Photographer of the Year winning inspirations, part one: Steve Mills on “The assassin”

We are marking the forthcoming publication of the new 2012 portfolio from the annual Wildlife Photographer of the Year exhibition with a mini-series of interviews with some of the category winners from last year.

Our first interviewee is Steve Mills whose 2011 category winning photo, ‘The assassin’, is pictured below.

Your photograph, “The assassin”, won the Wildlife Photographer of the Year 2011, Behaviour: Birds category last year. What draws you to birds as a subject in particular?

For me, all wildlife is wonderful but birds are simply fantastic. For one thing they are so accessible. Close encounters with other wild animals are few and far between. They tend to be secretive creatures of the night, reluctant to be seen. It’s birds that allow us that connection with the natural world. We see them everywhere – in the garden, in the park, above the city etc. My fascination has always been more than simply ‘What bird is that?’ but rather ‘What is it doing?’ and ‘Why is it doing it?’ and I think this lifelong interest in bird behaviour has helped me enormously in my photography.

Could you reveal a bit about the photo and the process of getting the shot?

Following a week of snow cover and sub-zero temperatures in the north-east of England many birds were struggling. Snipe and woodcock, amongst others, had been forced to the coast in the search for unfrozen feeding areas. Most had abandoned any pretence of secrecy and were probing anywhere there was even the tiniest patch of grass sticking up through the snow.

I drove around the lanes near my home looking for a likely spot and came across a tiny patch of exposed grass that would allow me to use the car as a hide with the sun well-positioned. With my 500 lens balanced on the window I settled down to wait. Eventually a snipe appeared and began frantically feeding only a few metres away. This was what I’d hoped for and felt my preparation had been suitably rewarded. What happened next was where the luck came in. As with all good wildlife photography there’s preparation, understanding the behaviour of your subject, some decent kit etc., but overriding all this is whether you get lucky.

The snipe, desperately hungry, showed little regard for its exposed position and within seconds had paid the ultimate price. As I watched the snipe through the camera my left eye caught a movement. A merlin arrived at speed inches above the snow, and hit the snipe talons first. The ensuing struggle lasted only a matter of seconds. After looking up, seemingly straight at me, the merlin gave a series of rapid and violent pecks to the head of the snipe to end the uneven contest. Of the 15 shots I was able to take this image worked best.

Have you any tips for aspiring wildlife photographers?

You’ve got to be passionate because it can be frustrating. There isn’t an album in the world big enough for all the ‘almost’ photos – those missed through not quite being in the right place, not reacting quickly enough or having crucially misjudged a setting. That happens to everyone and all you can do is to try to learn from these experiences to make you more likely to get the shot next time.

Wildlife, including birds, tends to be timid, so a long lens helps enormously but if you get to know how your subject behaves you can often predict what it will do and position yourself accordingly. For example, large birds always take off into the wind so by positioning yourself well you’ve got more chance of a bird flying towards you initially. Getting to know your subject also increases your chances of getting action shots such as a bird feeding, preening, wing-stretching, interacting with others etc. This type of action can often add punch to a photo.

Whatever camera you’re using, I recommend you make sure you’re completely comfortable with its settings. Make sure you can change them without losing vital moments having to fiddle about trying to find this or that button. Understanding your camera is vital because, in wildlife photography, you often don’t get a second chance.

Use the light to your advantage. If there is bright sunlight try shooting early in the morning or just before dusk when the shadows are less harsh and the bird is lit from a lower angle.

For birds, keep your shutter speed high. This is particularly important for moving or flying birds. To do this you may have to sacrifice depth of field or ISO.

Finally, never think that you have to travel across the country or even further afield to get great shots. My wife and I run a conservation organisation in Greece – Birdwing – and this takes me to spectacular birdwatching sites where I spend days at a time behind a camera, usually in wonderful light. Ironically however, this picture was taken only yards from my house in the north-east of England, which demonstrates something I’ve learned time and again – in wildlife photography you never know what is around the corner and that extra hour in the field can sometimes be richly rewarded.

Steve Mills’s websites:

http://stevemills-birdphotography.com

www.birdwing.eu

Steve is the author of Birdwatching in Northern Greece: A Site Guide – available now from NHBS

Read part two: Wildlife Photographer of the Year winning inspirations, part two: Peter Chadwick on “Taking off”.

Read part three: Wildlife Photographer of the Year winning inspirations, part three: Paul Souders on “The grace of giants”.

Pre-order now and save 20% when you buy the Wildlife Photographer of the Year Portfolio 22 book and wall calendar together:

Mushroom Identification: Pro Tips from Top UK Mycologists

September is upon us with morning mists and a slight chill in the air… it must be mushroom time! Around this time of year, books on mushroom identification and natural history appear with almost as much certainty as the fungi themselves. Two of our favourite mycologically-minded authors, Peter Marren and Geoffrey Kibby, give some useful and interesting tips for the keen mushroom hunter.

(Note: we cannot stress strongly enough the caution with which you should approach mushroom identification. Some mushrooms are edible, but some are deadly, and identification can be very difficult. As Geoffrey Kibby says below, if in doubt, throw it out!).

First up is Peter Marren, whose forthcoming book, Mushrooms, is the first in a new series of natural history publications, the British Wildlife Collection

Peter Marren’s tips on mushroom identification for the beginner

There are an awful lot of fungi – 2,400 species in the latest field guide and that’s just the larger ones. Fortunately, perhaps, most of them are rarely seen. There are only about a hundred really common ones, and they are the ones you need to know.

Forget about the ‘little brown fungi’ for now. Try getting to know an accessible group such as the waxcaps or the boletes, or the puffballs and their ‘relatives’. It will teach you a lot about the differences between species and the places to look for them.

Join a fungus foray organised by your local fungus group or wildlife trust, or, better still, attend a weekend course at a field centre. Direct contact is better than books.

Picking mushrooms does no harm. They are not plants but the fruit bodies of an organism living in the soil or in wood. Apples on the tree, as it were. And you will need to bring back specimens of fungi that are impossible to identify in the field.

Gathering and cooking wild fungi is great fun, especially as shared fungus feast. But never eat any that you cannot identify with confidence. There are a lot of poisonous fungi out there.

For fungi an x20 magnification hand lens is useful. At some point the dedicated forayer will need a microscope, but that, as they say, is a whole new ball park. Or playing field, as they are also known.

Peter Marren on recommended books for mushroom identification…

There are not many read-through books about fungi. I enjoyed Patrick Harding’s Mushroom Miscellany, a series of short chapters on all aspects of fungi, and the New Naturalist volume Fungi by Brian Spooner and Peter Roberts is all-embracing and thorough, but not for the faint-hearted. From Another Kingdom, published by the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh is an informal seminar on matters mycological, including ‘fungal monsters in science fiction’. The best field guide in my opinion is still Marcel Bon’s Mushrooms & Toadstools, first published back in 1987, although it needs updating. Paul Sterry and Barry Hughes’ Collins Complete Guide to British Mushrooms and Toadstools has the best colour photographs.

…and on his new book, Mushrooms

Mushrooms is my personal take on the world of fungi in Britain, about the pleasures of searching for mushrooms and toadstools, and why they matter. I have written it as a narrative, in current TV parlance as a ‘journey’, beginning with the extraordinary diversity of fungi and the ways in which they exploit the natural world to the history of the fungus foray and the controversy over gathering wild mushrooms for the pot. In the process I zoom in on the nature of names, both Latin and English, at the places which hold the greatest diversity of fungi, and our attempts to conserve rare and vanishing fungi. It is, I hope, a refreshing and amusing look at this ‘third world’ of life, written without jargon and in lively style. I hope it can be read with pleasure by anyone. It is full of lovely colour photographs.

Next up, Geoffrey Kibby, whose new photographic identification guide to the Genus Amanita is the fourth in a series of full colour fungi identification monographs, and is out now. In the following article Kibby discusses the finer points of mushroom identification:

The joys and tribulations of fungus identification

Firstly, let’s be quite clear: there are an awful lot of fungi! Just including those generally referred to as the larger fungi – those just a few millimetres across all the way up to species that can reach a metre or more – there are around three thousand species recorded in Britain.

Whether we call them all mushrooms, as the Americans tend to do, or toadstools as we often do in Britain, they form a huge and amazing array of species. The terms mushroom and toadstool are of course very vague with no actual specific scientific meaning, encompassing both edible and poisonous species. With such a large number of species to choose from, identification can be both difficult and frustrating, and if edibility is a factor then obviously getting a correct identification is even more important; a mistake can be, and sadly has often been, fatal.

General field guides are the usual starting point for most amateurs just starting out in mycology (the proper term for the study of fungi) but there is an obvious problem here: the number of species included. Many guides have just a few hundred species that may not cover enough of the species you will find. More comprehensive ones usually have about 1000 to 1500 species and are accordingly more useful. The largest guide yet produced (Collins Fungi Guide by Stefan Buczacki with beautiful watercolour paintings) has around 2,400 species, but that does not of course guarantee that you will produce a correct identification. Indeed too many choices might be as confusing as too few. Then there is the choice of whether to get one with photographs or paintings (both have their different advantages).

Many species can only be distinguished with certainty by using a microscope to examine their spores and other microscopic structures, or by the application of specific chemicals to produce colour reactions. More technical monographs are needed for these.

A field guide can only take you so far and show you a representative sample of a particular species. Fungi vary much more than most organisms and you will need to learn them in all their many and varied forms before you can confidently say you know a species well. The best way to learn is to get a good guide and then take it along on an organised fungal walk (or foray as they are usually called). Here you will usually be led by an experienced expert who can show you first hand the important features of each species as well as their particular ecology. The latter can be vital in fungus identification. Many fungi grow in association with specific trees or other plants and knowing this can help you to identify or even predict the species you may find.

By going on regular fungus walks, or perhaps joining a longer course over a weekend or a week you will gradually learn to recognise the commonest species which you will see on almost every walk and start to learn some of the more uncommon species also. Almost every county has a mushroom group and there are also larger, country-wide mycological societies such as the British Mycological Society or the Association of British Fungus Groups. These organisations can put you in touch with your local group as well as organising forays and workshops of their own and producing useful publications. The journal Field Mycology, which I edit for the BMS, is aimed at the beginner all the way to the specialist and mainly deals with larger fungi.

Comparing the actual fungi you find with the photos or paintings in your field guide will soon show the value of owning more than one guide. Each guide may have a different list of species and some will have better illustrations of a particular species than another. Most mycologists soon build up a small library of picture books! Using a digital camera to photograph specimens or trying your hand at making paintings of them and building up your own catalogue of illustrations is highly recommended also. Once you are more confident of the commoner species then there are a number of more specialist works, usually dealing with a specific group of fungi and this is often the best way to really make progress, by concentrating on a particular group which you find especially attractive or interesting.

I would certainly recommend the boletes as an ideal group to begin with. They are often large, very brightly coloured and with good field characters and include a number of excellent edible species. Almost all the species can be identified in the field with a little experience and a good reference work. After 48 years of studying fungi the boletes remain among my favourites and many other mycologists will say the same. The book on boletes which I have produced, British Boletes, aims to provide easy to use keys based mainly on field characters and photographs of the vast majority of the British species. My books tend to focus on the most widely studied and popular groups of fungi. Hence I have titles covering Russula (The Genus Russula in Great Britain), Agaricus (The Genus Agaricus in Britain) and my most recent work The Genus Amanita in Great Britain. All are available from NHBS. Further titles will be forthcoming in the next few months, in particular one on the genus Lactarius, commonly called Milkcaps and further down the road an illustrated field guide to 1200 species of larger fungi.

Geoffrey Kibby’s top tips for safe mushroom identification

Many people come into mycology via a desire to try eating something a little more exotic than the shop bought mushroom. There are many edible species and they can have tastes and textures quite unlike the cultivated species. Hunting for edibles can be a wonderful experience but there are several rules to follow if your hunt is to have a happy outcome:

Make sure you are allowed to collect, many woodlands or parks have restrictions on picking.

Obey any local rules on how many you can pick and try to leave some for others to admire, don’t ‘vacuum’ the woods of everything you see.

Collect only specimens in good condition; old or rotten specimens will not make a good meal and can cause serious stomach upsets.

MOST IMPORTANT OF ALL: you must be absolutely sure of your identification, some mushrooms are deadly and a mistake can quickly become fatal. If you are a beginner then always get the advice of an expert. Stick to a few, unmistakable species. IF IN DOUBT, THROW IT OUT.

Always keep aside a specimen of anything you collect to eat and if it is a species you have not eaten before then sample just a little—even good edibles can cause upsets in some people (many people can’t eat strawberries or nuts for example).

Mycology, or mushrooming, can appeal on many levels, from the simple pleasure of seeing strange and wonderful organisms to the intellectual challenge of trying to identify them and understand their intricate life cycles. But the starting point is, and always will be, a good book!

And finally… hand lenses to help with mushroom identification

Last week we published a blog post with advice on purchasing a hand lens, plus a useful comparison chart showing the various lenses you can buy from NHBS.

Read The NHBS Guide to Buying a Hand Lens

Birding Challenge: ingenious birding-related inventions wanted!

Instructables is a “maker” site, where people can share their home-made creations – and how to build them – with other inventive types around the world. They have a new birding channel for all bird-related projects: equipment people have made or modified, projects for the back-garden birder, or sharing skills and insider tips on birding. To launch the channel they are running a competition.

So if you have any home-grown birding projects that you want to share, and you are interested in the chance to win some cracking prizes, check out the competition page for the Birding Challenge. The competition entry call-out is also for software tools or apps that can be used use in the field.

The organiser of the challenge is a UK birder resident in San Francisco, and of course this competition is open to people from anywhere in the world. It closes at 11:59pm August 28th PST, on the dot, so you have just over a week to get in the shed and start sketching out your winning design!

Dormouse Nest Tubes – fast, secure placement

How have we improved our dormouse nest tubes?

We have just released a new and improved model of the dormouse nest tube. What’s different? Well, we have tried to tackle two of the most frequently encountered problems with setting up dormouse nest tubes. (1) It can be tricky to attach them securely to a branch and (2) once ‘securely attached’ they are prone to slipping. To reduce these issues we have added retaining loops to the base of the nest tube to stop slippage and to enable faster placement.

We also supply 71cm cable ties for fast set-up. If you prefer using garden wire to secure your nest tubes then this method will also be easier using the new loops.

Dormouse survey – best practice

hazel dormouse For the non- (or new) professionals out there a few quick pointers on best practice for a survey using dormouse nest tubes.

Surveys should not be limited to habitat perceived as ‘optimal’ but should be undertaken in any areas of affected woody habitat (including adjacent areas if the impact of development is likely to extend beyond the site footprint).
Normally at least 50 nest tubes should be placed at roughly 15-20m intervals and these should be left in place (and checked monthly) for the majority of the active season.
In order to have any chance of obtaining a license to carry out work affecting dormouse habitat you must first conduct a survey with a probability of 20 or above of finding dormice if they are present (although please remember that an absence of evidence is not evidence of absence). To calculate the probability score for your survey you add together the scores (Table 1) for the months during which the survey was conducted (for surveys conducted using 50 dormouse nest tubes and following the advice given in points 1 and 2 above).

dormouse survey results

Taken at face value this means that all dormouse surveys should begin by June at the latest; however, it is possible to start a survey later than this under certain conditions. For example, you can increase survey effort by increasing the number of dormouse nest tubes deployed (if you use 100 tubes you can double the scores in Table 1). Note though that surveys conducted using a large number of tubes for a short period are not good practice and nor are surveys where tubes are crowded together at intervals of less than 15-20m (although 10m intervals may be acceptable in very small sites).

For further details we recommend you consult the latest guidance from Natural England in England or your national licensing authority (e.g. Countryside Council for Wales, Scottish Natural Heritage, etc.).

Dormouse resources:

The Mammal Society

Dormice: A Tale of Two Species
Pat Morris

Living with Dormice
Sue Eden

Dormouse survey products:

Dormouse nest tubes

Dormouse box

Getting started with the SM2BAT+ bat detector

The Wildlife Acoustics Song Meter SM2BAT+ is a passive ultrasound recorder that can be left out in the field for long periods of time to record ultrasound at frequencies of up to 192 kHz. The SM2BAT+ comes packaged in a plain green weatherproof box making it easy to position discretely without the need for expensive or time consuming efforts to weatherproof/camouflage it. Setting a bat detector up for passive monitoring can be a slightly daunting experience for the first time user so we have produced an annotated internal diagram (see below right – click the image to enlarge) and this blog post describing our experiences getting started with the SM2BAT+. Despite feeling a little scared at the sight of circuit boards I am pleased to report that I found the SM2BAT+ to be very user friendly – read on for our idiot’s guide to setting up an SM2BAT+.

Getting started

The first thing you will need to do is insert four D-Cell batteries into the slots. A number of variables affect battery life including the quality/type of the battery, temperature, and the recording mode. The manual produced by Wildlife Acoustics suggests that if high quality Alkaline D-Cells are used at 20^oC then you should get 130 hours recording time at 192 kHz mono and 100 hours recording time at 192 kHz stereo or 384 kHz mono when using in WAV mode and over 300 hours of recording time when using ZCA mode.

Next you will need to insert an SDHC card into one of the Flash Card Slots. Wildlife Acoustics recommend using good quality SDHC Class 4 or Class 6 cards and a single 32GB card should easily last a minimum of 2 weeks.

How to programme your SM2BAT+

Now it is time to programme your SM2BAT+. Setting up a simple schedule is very easy, switch the unit on by pressing the WAKE/EXIT button. Once it has woken up you will be able to see whether your SDHC card has been accepted and how much spare memory is available. To programme your unit press the SELECT button to see the menu; then to scroll through the menu options press the UP and DOWN buttons, press BACK to move back up a level, and press SELECT to move left and/or toggle through a list of options.

Below left shows a schematic (click to enlarge) of the Song Meter Main Menu and includes the settings I used for a trial run of the SM2BAT+. The first page of the menu includes three options – Schedule, Settings and Utilities. Setting the schedule could not be easier, press SELECT when the cursor is flashing next to Schedule, then press SELECT again, update the time using the UP and DOWN buttons then press SELECT again to keep moving to the left filling in the details as you go. You will see that I have set our SM2BAT+ to come on at 20:30 and record for 10 hours.

Press BACK to come out of the Schedule menu and then DOWN to move to Settings, then SELECT again to enter the Settings menu. For a quick test of the unit you will need to set the time and date using the UP, DOWN, SELECT, and BACK buttons as before. Finally select AUDIO to check the recording settings. In my test run I opted for a Sample rate of 384000 (384 kHz) because we have lesser horseshoe bats in the Totnes area. This is because the maximum frequency recorded is equal to half the sample rate – consequently, at a sample rate of 384 kHz the SM2BAT+ will record ultrasound at frequencies up to 192 kHz on one channel (perfect for lesser horseshoes that echolocate at around 110 kHz). If you want to use both channels (i.e. two microphones) you have to record at a maximum sample rate of 192 kHz. Although you may miss lesser horseshoe bats the big advantage of using both channels is that you can separate the microphones (using extension cables – available from NHBS) by up to 100m, effectively doubling the number of bat detectors you own for the price of a couple of cables. Alternatively you can separate the microphones by 10-20m to measure flight directionality along a linear feature.

Next you need to select which channel to record on. Under Channels I selected Mono-L to record from the left hand microphone input. For Compression I selected Off which means that the SM2BAT+ is in trigger mode and records individual WAV files for each trigger. Analook users may prefer to use the ZCA option which records individual ZCA files for each trigger. Alternatively, some users may prefer the WAC0 option which produces a continuous compressed WAC file for the duration of the recording period (actually the files are size limited so I found that 1hr 33min chunks are produced). That’s it… all you need to do now is take your SM2BAT+ to your field site.

Field set-up

Once at your field site check the settings and do a test recording. To do this plug some headphones into the headphone jack and start recording by pressing both the UP and DOWN buttons simultaneously. Once the recording has started press SELECT to view the channels and then make some ultrasound by eg. tapping your fingers and thumb together or rattling some keys. If all is well then put your unit back to sleep, seal the weatherproof enclosure (don’t forget to take a screwdriver with you) and plug your microphone in to the left hand microphone input (using your extension cable makes hiding the unit much easier). It is worth remembering that the indicator LED is visible when the lid is on so make sure this cannot be seen by passers-by.

Data analysis

Downloading the data is also easy – simply remove the SDHC card and place it into an SD card reader. To analyse the data I used Pettersson’s BatSound v4.12. My WAV files opened immediately and I used the Close, open, next button to scroll quickly through the files so the analysis was quick and painless. On my first night I recorded soprano pipistrelle and greater horseshoe bats in the centre of Totnes.

New: Carwardine’s Ultimate Wildlife Experiences – plus great backlist special offer

‘Ultimate Wildlife Experiences’ is the new book from Mark Carwardine: zoologist, conservationist, award-winning writer, TV and radio presenter, widely published wildlife photographer, best-selling author and columnist and wildlife tour leader. Carwardine’s last account of world wildlife travel – 2009’s Last Chance to See: In the Footsteps of Douglas Adams – found him teaming up with Stephen Fry to retrace the steps of Carwardine’s 1980 journey with Douglas Adams in search of some of the world’s most endangered animals.

His new book – with a foreword by Fry – is a product of his lifetime’s experience of wildlife encounters around the world and introduces 20 extraordinary adventures including catching sight of the rare spirit bears of Canada’s Great Bear Rainforest, navigating the hostile world of the Komodo dragon in Indonesia and finding favour with the curious and friendly Florida manatees.

Two of Carwardine’s classic marine wildlife guides are now available from NHBS at nearly half price:

On the Trail of the Whale

£4.99

was £9.95

The Shark Watcher’s Handbook

£9.99

was £16.99

The NHBS Batalogue 2012 – available now

The Batalogue is our annual catalogue of bat detectors and accessories for bat work and bat groups. There are hundreds of products and accessories to choose from, along with detailed specifications and comparison charts.

How to get the Batalogue

Option #1 Browse the Batalogue online

Option #2 Call (+44 (0) 1803 865913), or email us, for a free printed copy

New user info for the Echo Meter EM3 Bat Detector from Wildlife Acoustics

We recently received the following information from Wildlife Acoustics to help you get the most out of your Echo Meter EM3

Dear EM3 User,

Congratulations on your purchase of the Wildlife Acoustics Echo Meter EM3 Bat Detector! We think the EM3 represents the most advanced technology available in a handheld detector and provides unparalleled functionality at a fraction of the price of other professional detectors. A piece of equipment with this much technology does, however, have a learning curve. To help you master the skills necessary to get the best performance from your new detector we would like to share some tips and best practices (and common mistakes) we have learned since its release. We think the following information will help you get the most out of your EM3.

Update your firmware!

We are constantly making improvements to all of our products via firmware updates. These improvements can include important bug fixes as well as new functionality or requested features. We provide these updates at no charge to add further value to our products. Please go to www.wildlifeacoustics.com/downloads to download the latest version of firmware and read the release notes on what has changed. The current firmware version loaded on your Echo Meter can be seen on the top left of the “splash screen” at start-up. At the time of this email we are on version 1.1.2.

Introducing a whole new approach to zero crossing

With this email we would like to introduce a free new software we have developed called Kaleidoscope and a whole new approach to zero crossing. Kaleidoscope converts WAV or WAC files into zero crossing files with incredible quality and speed. In fact the results are superior not only to any existing zero crossing conversion software but they are also superior to what would be possible with native zero crossing. Don’t just trust us, try it and let us know what you think!

The conversion is incredibly fast. It can convert several nights of data in just a few minutes. This represents a 30x improvement over our existing WAC2WAV software, which was on par or faster than any other conversion software.

Kaleidoscope can even convert zero crossing to WAV (yes you read that right). This is a great way to be able to convert your Zero Crossing files into audible WAV files. Kaleidoscope is available on the download page of our site (see the link above). It is currently in Beta and will ultimately replace our WAC2WAV conversion software.

What about native zero crossing?

As you know the EM3 also has the ability to record zero crossing files natively and you might be wondering how that compares to full spectrum files converted to zero crossing using Kaleidoscope. We feel the results from Kaleidoscope are superior to native zero crossing, whether it be on the EM3 or any other zero crossing recorder. The zero crossing results from Kaleidoscope are so good and the conversion is so fast that we are now recommending this as the best approach. Feel free to test this out if you need convincing. You can record simultaneously in WAV and zero crossing, convert the WAV files to zero crossing and compare the results.

If you do prefer to stick with the native zero crossing, here are a couple tips to get the best results. Always be sure to adjust the zero crossing sensitivity (just hold down the speaker button until you enter FDAdj made). The default setting is quite high and will not pick up many bats. Also, always adjust the setting using headphones. If you adjust using the speaker, the feedback from the speaker will result in a much higher than optimal setting. You want to set the level just to the point where you only hear a little noise rather than a constant din of noise. This should be three or four squares on the display.

We have found that the GPS attachment for the EM3 can introduce noise into the zero crossing circuit. This necessitates setting the sensitivity up a couple squares. For best zero crossing results with the GPS please consider our recommendation to use WAC and convert using Kaleidoscope. As an added bonus, when using the GPS in WAC mode, you will retain not only the location of every recording but the entire transect path. Kaleidoscope can output the recording locations and the path during the conversion process into a KML file compatible with Google Earth!

Try Real Time Expansion (RTE)!

We have included three monitoring modes in the EM3. Heterodyne and Frequency Division were included for those familiar and comfortable with those technologies. We also developed our own novel technique for monitoring called Real Time Expansion. This technique provides all of the frequency and timing information of the original call. It has superior tonality to Frequency Division and does not require tuning like Heterodyne. We consider it the best monitoring method on the market. If you have been using Heterodyne or Frequency Division, we strongly encourage you to try RTE.

Screen adjustments

Remember that you can adjust both the brightness and contrast of the screen to suit any lighting condition and preference. If you momentarily press and release the Display button, you can then adjust brightness using either the Plus and Minus buttons or Up and Down buttons. The contrast is adjusted using the Right and Left Arrow buttons. You can also switch between “black on white” and “white on black” display modes by holding down the Display button.

Getting back to the present

We have seen a common confusion where users are monitoring for bats while scrolling back through the spectrogram buffer to look at past calls. When you are viewing calls at or near the end of the buffer and a bat comes along the end of the buffer begins to disappear as new data is written to the front. This can give the illusion that you are viewing “the present bat” because the buffer begins to move making the spectrogram scroll. To get “back to the present” to see the new bat calls being written to the spectrogram, just double click the X/Y button.

Use headphones for best sound quality

The speaker on the EM3 was included for convenience and can provide an excellent monitoring experience, but for the very best quality, we encourage you to try monitoring with headphones. Headphones have better fidelity, greater volume and more bandwidth than the speaker so they really bring the bat playback to life.

Always use the EM3 with charged batteries

The EM3 monitors battery level and automatically shuts down when the battery is near depletion. This prevents the circuitry from getting into a state where it is not appropriately powered resulting in erratic behavior. But if you power up the unit with nearly depleted batteries, it will exhibit this erratic behavior before the detector gets the chance to determine that the batteries are nearly depleted. It will be stuck in bad state and you will not be able to power down without removing a battery. Batteries tend to regain voltage over short durations of no use. This means that if you do not charge the batteries after using them and then power up the detector after some time, the batteries will have regained just enough voltage to power up but not enough to supply proper power. Also be aware, that the EM3 is never truly off, but in a deep sleep state so as to be able to retain the spectrogram buffer and clock. After a few weeks the batteries will deplete even after no use.

If you get stuck, reset

If, while using the EM3, you find that you have made a bad setting or gotten into an unknown state you can always reset the unit back to factory defaults. You simply pop a battery from the battery tray and reinsert while holding down the left button. Continue holding the button until the splash screen appears. Sometimes an apparently broken unit can be something as simple as the brightness having been turned quite a low at night appearing as though it won’t power up in the morning! This procedure would reset the brightness setting to default, apparently bringing the unit back to life.

Happy detecting.

Wildlife Acoustics, Inc.

NHBS Equipment Team:

+44 (0)1803 865913

customer.services@nhbs.co.uk

Save 35% on ten natural history classics from Johns Hopkins UP this June

Always setting a high standard for scientific publishing, Johns Hopkins University Press titles span the range of our natural history subject areas providing solid high-quality research from top academics.

These ten books from JHUP have been – and continue to be – bestsellers at NHBS, and they are all on special offer at 35% off this June:

Ecological and Behavioral Methods for the Study of Bats

First published in 1988, “Ecological and Behavioral Methods for the Study of Bats” is widely acknowledged as the primary reference for both amateur and professional bat researchers. Only one group of mammals includes more species than bats. Bats live on every continent except Antarctica, range from deserts to tropical forests to mountains, and their activities have a profound effect on the ecosystems in which they live.

The Biology of Small Mammals

The first exploration of the lives of small mammals undertaken in decades. Mammalogist Joseph F. Merritt offers an engaging, in-depth discussion about a diverse array of small mammals, from the rare Kitti’s hog-nosed bat of Southeast Asia to the bizarre aye-aye of Madagascar to the familiar woodchuck of North America.

Walker’s Mammals of the World (Complete Edition)

The sixth edition is 24% longer, and the number of separate genera has increased by 75 – among them, three remarkable large ungulates recently discovered in the forests of Indochina. New also is a full account of the woolly mammoth, now known to have survived until less than 4,000 years ago.

Walker’s Bats of the World

Introduction by Thomas H. Kunz and Elizabeth D. Pierson. The first single segment of the leading reference workWalker’s Mammals of the World to become available as a separate volume. It is a complete guide to this varied order of mammals and includes scientific and common names, as well as the number and distribution of species, measurements and physical traits, habitat, daily and seasonal activity, population dynamics, home range, social life, reproduction, and longevity.

The Rise of Amphibians: 365 Million Years of Evolution

For nearly 100 million years amphibians and their ancestors dominated the terrestrial and shallow water environments of the earth. Archaic animals with an amphibious way of life gave rise not only to modern frogs, salamanders, and caecilians but also to the ancestors of reptiles, birds, and mammals.

Mountain Gorillas: Biology, Conservation and Coexistence

Tucked into one of the most beautiful and conflicted regions of the world are the last of the mountain gorillas. These apes have survived centuries of human encroachment into their range and decades of intense conflict and violence. The remaining 720 mountain gorillas exist in a fragile habitat, nestled in an area torn by human interests and needs for land, water, and minerals.

Dragonfly Genera of the New World: An Illustrated and Annotated Key to the Anisoptera

Dragonfly Genera of the New World is a beautifully illustrated and comprehensive guide to the taxonomy and ecology of dragonflies in North, Middle, and South America. A reference of the highest quality, this book reveals their striking beauty and complexity. Although Odonata – dragonflies and damselflies – are among the most studied groups of insects, until now there has been no reliable means to identify the New World genera of either group.

Damselfly Genera of the New World: An Illustrated and Annotated Key to the Zygoptera

In this companion volume to “Dragonfly Genera of the New World”, Rosser W. Garrison, Natalia von Ellenrieder, and Jerry A. Louton provide a comprehensive, fully illustrated guide to the damselflies of North, Central, and South America. Damselflies are more diverse and harder to identify than dragonflies.

Forest Ecosystems

This acclaimed textbook is the most comprehensive available in the field of forest ecology. Designed for advanced students of forest science, ecology, and environmental studies, it is also an essential reference for forest ecologists, foresters, and land managers.

Chimpanzee Politics: Power and Sex among Apes

The first edition of Frans de Waal’s “Chimpanzee Politics” was acclaimed not only by primatologists for its scientific achievement but also by politicians, business leaders, and social psychologists for its remarkable insights into the most basic human needs and behaviors. Twenty-five years later, this book is considered a classic.

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New full-colour monograph focuses on the Peregrine Falcon

New Holland have just published the third in their unique occasional series of ornithological monographs. Packed with brilliant full-colour photography, these attractive books are written by experts and passionate advocates for the particular species.

Patrick Stirling-Aird has studied Peregrine Falcons for more than 25 years. He is Secretary of the Scottish Raptor Study Groups and is an advisor to the British and Scottish governments on the conservation of the species. His monograph on the Peregrine has just been published and combines a detailed exploration of the science and natural history of the bird with an anecdotal tone borne of his years of personal experience.

Also available now in the same series:

Kingfisher by David Chandler and Ian Llewellyn (2010)

Barn Owl by David Chandler (2011)